


can't decide if it's a choice, getting swept away

by niallszayn



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Minor Liam Payne/Louis Tomlinson, Past Perrie Edwards/Zayn Malik, Pining, Strangers to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-16
Updated: 2015-06-26
Packaged: 2018-04-03 12:51:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 32,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4101639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/niallszayn/pseuds/niallszayn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"This is without a doubt the strangest, craziest thing that's ever happened to him. He doesn't even know how to start explaining this to his friends. What is he gonna say to Liam when he leaves on Friday evening? It sounds unreal to himself, how is he gonna make others believe he's not just imagining himself in a typical romcom?<br/>Except for how this isn't a romcom because there isn't going to be more to it than one night at Zayn's flat where they'll make Perrie believe that Zayn is over her, even though he clearly isn't. No matter how pretty Niall thinks Zayn is."</p><p>Or, the one where Niall helps Zayn convince his ex he's over her and they're in too deep very quickly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the beginning

**Author's Note:**

> hi! who doesn't love pretend dating fics? i certainly do, so i started writing this about 3 months ago and i think i've finally gotten to a point where i can start posting. this fic is most likely gonna have 3 chapters, each about the same length, and i'll be posting them once a week. thank you to everyone encouraging me and staying interested after i posted a snippet at the start of this journey! love you, and i hope you enjoy this :)  
> title is from taylor swift's _treacherous_

Usually, Niall spends the ride on the tube home from work listening to music and trying not to fall asleep.

Today however, he doesn't have any trouble staying awake, at least not since this guy entered the train and took the seat next to him. Falling asleep isn't an option anymore, because it's not possible to sneak glances at his face through closed eyes.

Niall doesn't want to seem creepy but it's just that this guy has the nicest face he's ever seen, eyelashes long enough to brush his cheeks when he blinks, full, pouty lips, a pretty nose and cheekbones to die for. The stubble he's sporting is pretty hot too and Niall would like to find out what it feels like to kiss along his jaw and down to the collar of his white button up shirt very much.

He's been trying to work up the courage to say something for the past few minutes but even though he's kind of good at pulling people in a club or at a bar, he has no idea how to chat someone up on the tube.

The tube stops at the next station and the doors open, people pushing out and new ones entering.

There's a girl among them, beautiful, blonde hair and big blue eyes, heavily done up, but Niall only really notices her because her eyes light up the second she spots the hot guy next to him.

“Zayn!” She exclaims, and Niall can feel him go rigid next to him. He looks over carefully and sees there's a tight smile on his face. Well, at least Niall knows his name now.

The girl sits down opposite them, leaning forward into the guys, _Zayn’s_ , space. “Hey Perrie”, he says.

“How've you been?” she asks and Niall wonders if she can't see how uncomfortable Zayn is. “Haven't seen you in ages, we should catch up some time.”

Zayn doesn't seem thrilled by that suggestion but nods anyway. “Yeah, sure.” Niall wonders if they used to be a thing. Maybe the girl isn't over it as much as the guy is.

“I've been well”, Zayn continues, and then hesitates. “Actually, I forgot to introduce you, but this is my boyfriend.”

Niall feels an arm around his shoulder and he looks up from his phone he'd been trying to seem focused on with a start. He looks straight into the eyes of the guy he's been lusting after for the whole ride and they look sort of desperate, and very pleading. It takes a moment for Niall to register what has just been said and another for him to realise that this is actually happening, not in a movie but in his own life, but then he gets a grip and smiles at the girl (Perrie?) as if nothing is wrong.

“Um, yeah, hi. Niall.”

She looks thrown off for a moment and glances at Zayn disbelievingly, but then she carefully schools her features into a polite smile. “It's nice to meet you, Niall. I'm Perrie, Zayn and I used to date.”

Niall can practically feel Zayn's scowl at this and he almost laughs. Two can play a game.

“I've heard about you”, he just says, reaching for Zayn's hand. If he's gonna play the boyfriend, he's gonna do it good. (Zayn's hand also feels very nice in his but that's beside the point.)

It's quiet for a second as Perrie watches them intently, as if she's still doubting what she's seeing.

“You should come to ours for tea some time”, Niall blurts out, and wants to punch himself right after. Him and Zayn aren't actually dating, even if their fingers fit together very nicely, so why did he just invite his pretend boyfriend’s ex to their shared place? He’s pretty sure that’s what happened, at least.

“You live together? That must've been quick; you and I broke up barely a year ago.” So it definitely sounded like they live together for Perrie as well.

“Not yet, Niall just stays at mine most of the time”, Zayn explains and somehow it sends shivers down Niall’s spine to hear him say his name.

“Well, I'd love to come”, Perrie says, and Niall almost groans. What has he done? “Are you busy Friday night?”

“Got no plans so far, what about you babe?” Zayn turns to Niall again and the pleading look is back in his eyes, so Niall plays along. There could definitely be worse things than pretending to be Zayn’s boyfriend. After all, Zayn’s the fittest lad Niall’s laid eyes on in ages and he seems like a nice guy as well. What could go wrong?

“Nothing besides the thing we talked about last night, remember? But we can… _do_ that another time.” He says it as suggestively as possible and feels victorious when Zayn blushes and Perrie looks uncomfortable when he turns to her again. “Friday’s fine, come over around seven?”

“Sure, is it still the same address, Zayn?”

Zayn nods and Perrie smiles at them both. “Well, this is my stop but it was nice running into you. I'll see you on Friday!”

“See you”, Niall replies while Zayn only lifts a hand in a weak wave.

The second she's off the train, they both turn to each other.

“I'm so sorry –“Zayn starts at the same time as Niall says: “Oh my god, sorry for –“

There's some awkward chuckling and then Zayn asks: “What are you apologising for? I'm sorry I dragged you into this.”

“I'm sorry I made it more complicated”, Niall says, glancing down at his hands that feel different now they're not holding Zayn's. “I have no idea why I invited her.”

“I was the one who started the whole thing because I can't even face my ex-girlfriend”, Zayn mumbles and Niall thinks he gets it now. _Zayn_ is the one who's not completely over her, and he doesn't want to seem like he hasn't got a grip on things in front of her.

“Oh”, he says. “So my job is to convince her you're totally over her?”

“You don't have to”, Zayn hurriedly says, and he's still not looking at Niall. “I can still make this right, you don't have to sacrifice your Friday night for me. I didn't even ask if you're into blokes oh my god, you probably feel so awkward –“

“Zayn, hey”, Niall interrupts his rambling. “I don't mind. I don't have any plans on Friday, was just gonna laze around my flat, and I don't mind at all that you're a guy.”

“Oh. Good.”

“Yeah. We're gonna play the happy couple in front Perrie on Friday and when you meet her next time you can say that I turned out to be a proper arse and you dumped me when you realised you're much better off without me.”

Zayn laughs at that and Niall smiles, happy to finally see the scowl lift from his pretty face.

“So how about you give me your number now so we can figure out the details, because the next stop is mine”, Niall suggests when he realises how much time has passed.

“Yeah, sure” Zayn agrees and pulls his phone out to hand it to Niall.

They smile at each other a little awkwardly when Niall stands as the tube slows down. How are you supposed to treat your pretend boyfriend?

“Well then”, he coughs nervously. “I'll see you on Friday then? And don't worry, I won’t let you down.”

“Thank you“, Zayn says, sounding so sincere it makes Niall feel all mushy. He doesn't have time for more than a smile and a wave though because the tube stops and he has to hurry out of the carriage to avoid getting crushed by the people squeezing in. Early evenings on the London Underground are a nightmare.

He catches one last glimpse of Zayn looking at him through the window of the train before it leaves and he lets out a breath, bending forward with his hands on his knees for a few seconds.

This is without a doubt the strangest, craziest thing that's ever happened to him. He doesn't even know how to start explaining this to his friends. What is he gonna say to his flatmate and best friend Liam when he leaves on Friday evening? It sounds unreal to himself, how is he gonna make others believe he's not just imagining himself in a typical romcom?

Except for how this isn't a romcom because there isn't going to be more to it than one night at Zayn's flat where they'll make Perrie believe that Zayn is over her, even though he clearly isn't. No matter how pretty Niall thinks Zayn is.

He laughs quietly to himself. What a mess, this is definitely gonna be the best story anyone's gonna tell when he goes home for Christmas this year.

When he gets home, Liam’s sat on the sofa waiting for him.

“Heyyy”, he says, “what’d you bring for dinner? I'm starving.”

“Aw shit, mate”, Niall groans, dropping down next to him. “I totally forgot it was my turn. You'll never guess what happened today.”

“Starving, Ni”, Liam repeats and Niall sighs.

“Alright, I'll go and order us pizza but while we wait you'll have to listen to my story.”

After Niall has finished recounting his experience on the tube, Liam just stares at him. “I don't...is this another one of your pranks? Wait, did Lou make you do this?”

“Your boyfriend’s got nothing to do with this“, Niall assures him with a laugh. This is going exactly how he expected it to. “It's not a prank either; I know how it sounds but it's not.”

Liam looks at him with scrutiny and then starts laughing. “This is one of those things that would only happen to you. What are the odds?”

“I know, right?” Niall giggles. “I can't believe it, I'm still as disbelieving as I was when he first said I was his boyfriend.”

“But he's fit?”

“Dunno if that's the appropriate word”, Niall sighs. “Beautiful, more like.”

“Well, you've got a whole evening to show him you're not only good at _pretending_ to be his boyfriend”, Liam winks.

“Nah”, Niall makes. “Don't think he's interested in anything, plus I don't feel like being a rebound. Or, I don't know, for him to feel obligated to sleep with me because I helped him out.”

“At least he couldn't have found a nicer person to be his fake boyfriend”, Liam says with a smile. “He's lucky it's you, Nialler. And maybe he'll know it too.”

They eat their pizza in silence when it arrives, both of them lost in their own thoughts. Niall is almost finished when his phone buzzes.

 _hope you got home safe :) you can still change your mind btw!!_ It's from Zayn, and he's added the see-no-evil-monkey which makes Niall smile.

He sends back **_it'll be fun, im not backing out now_** **_!_** with the woman in the red dress emoji.

Liam sends him a curious glance. “Are you already texting him?”

“Technically, he texted me”, Niall jokes.

Zayn sends another monkey covering his eyes and Liam sees, exclaims “That's flirting! He's flirting!” to which Niall only rolls his eyes.

**_my flatmate is annoying. His name is liam btw, just in case it comes up on Friday_ **

_good to know :D any more flatmates/friends I should know about?_

**_liam’s boyfriend louis. My cousin willie. Couple more Irish lads but if you refer to them as LIC it'll be fine hahah_ **

_LIC ?_

**_it stands for london irish crew, we made it up cause we're all irish people living in london_ **

_sounds nice! Where in ireland are you from?_

**_small town called mullingar_** , Niall texts back, together with a link to the Wikipedia article.

It continues like this throughout the evening and the next morning, they text each other random facts about themselves to get some background knowledge, and Niall learns a lot about Zayn's best friend Harry who sounds like a top lad, about his sisters back in Bradford, and about his job. Apparently he’s a policeman who currently does a lot of the paperwork instead of going out into the field, but he seems to really like it.

During lunch break, Niall gets a call. And okay, maybe they’ve been texting a lot but he’s still surprised to see Zayn’s name flash across his phone screen before he picks it up with a surprised “Hi?”

“Hey, is this a bad time?”

“No, no”, Niall says and tries not to think about how nice Zayn’s voice sounds. “I’m on lunch break. What’s up?”

“I was just wondering…and I don’t want you to feel obligated or anything, but I was thinking that if you’re not busy tonight you could come over to my flat? To get to know it a bit, I mean. We said you more or less lived with me, so I just thought –“

“Yeah”, Niall interrupts Zayn’s rambling. “Yeah, sure, good idea. Can you give me your address?”

“Oh, great”, Zayn says, sounding surprised. “I’ll text it to you, okay? And thank you.”

“Nothing to thank me for, Zayn”, Niall insists. “I’ll just come over after work, alright? Want me to bring food?”

“That’s alright, I’ll take care of it. You up for Thai?”

“Always”, Niall laughs. “I’ll see you tonight?”

“See you then!”

Zayn hangs up and Niall laughs incredulously to himself. Maybe he shouldn’t be this happy about getting to spend time with a guy he might very well fancy if said guy does not and will not ever feel the same way, but he can’t really help getting excited about a second evening spent with Zayn. Which is maybe a bit premature considering they haven't even spent _one_ evening with each other, but Niall's looking forward to it nonetheless.

After work he gets off the tube two stops later than usually, hoping to spot Zayn somewhere, but the other lad must've been on an earlier train. Makes sense, Niall figures, if he wants to get food on his way home and still arrive before Niall.

He pulls out his phone to look at the directions once more, but Zayn's flat isn't too hard to find. It's in a building much like Niall's, five stories high with flats on both sides of the hall.

Niall gets buzzed in when he rings the doorbell and walks up the stairs to the third floor where Zayn said his flat was on the right side.

Zayn's waiting for him in the open door when he gets there, smile on his face, and he's at least as beautiful as Niall remembers.

 _Shit_ , he thinks, _get a grip, Horan_.

“Hey”, Zayn says. “You found it.”

“Someone must've given me great directions”, Niall jokes and follows Zayn into his flat. It looks tidy and cosy, with lots of pictures on the walls. It seems to be a mixture of photos and paintings.

Niall looks at one of them while he shrugs out of his jacket and notices the tiny signature in one corner, an intricate “zm”. He knows Zayn's last name is Malik because Zayn told him so he'd know where to ring, and he turns to him curiously. “Did you paint this?”

Zayn looks embarrassed, scratching the back his neck. “Uh, yeah. Most of these are mine.”

“Sick”, Niall says, impressed. “You're really talented.”

He doesn't get a proper response, Zayn blushes and mutters something unintelligible before heading towards what Niall assumes is the kitchen.

“Make yourself comfortable”, he calls. “I'll bring the food.”

Niall grins and walks further into the flat, looking around curiously. The furniture looks comfortable and lived in, but in good condition and the photos on the walls are of him with his family and a guy with a head full of curls who has to be Harry.

Looking at them, Niall has an idea. “We should take a picture or two”, he tells Zayn, joining him in the small kitchen.

“What?” Zayn asks, turning around with a confused frown.

“You've got so many photos of the people you care about around here, wouldn't it make sense for there to be some of us together as well? I mean, we're supposed to almost live together already.”

“You're right”, Zayn says, sounding relieved. “That's a really good idea. We could go to the park after we eat and take one there and another one here later so they don't look the same.”

“I've got a snapback I could put on for one of them”, Niall agrees.

“And I could put on a beanie.” Zayn puts their plates on the table and offers Niall a beer that he gladly takes. “We'll put those two in plain sight, should be enough.”

Niall nods but is already too busy eating to reply. Zayn watches him, clearly amused, and Niall swallows, embarrassed. “Fact about me: I love food.”

“Not the worst quality you could have”, Zayn chuckles. “I'm glad you like it, even if I haven't even made it myself.”

“Do you usually cook?”

“Nah”, Zayn shrugs. “I'm pretty terrible at it. Do you?”

“Yeah, I can cook the basics, like”, Niall says. “Been trying to experiment lately though, I bought one of Jamie Oliver’s books. I like making chicken curries and stuff like that.”

“I like eating those, so we can definitely say you've cooked it for me before.”

“Sure”, Niall agrees. “Gotta get a bit more familiar with your kitchen when we get back from the park.”

The walk to the park only takes them a couple of minutes and the sun is still up when they get there. Niall's quite thankful for his snapback.

They take a couple of selfies (“Let's try and look as couple-y as possible”, Zayn says) until they're both happy with one of them. Both of them are smiling widely, Niall's looking at Zayn instead of the camera and Zayn is pushing his beanie up his forehead because it had slipped down. It looks like they're very happy and as if they didn't already take twenty other selfies beforehand.

“This is a good one”, Zayn says, sounding impressed. “We do look like a couple.”

Niall tries not to let that get to his head too much. They're not a couple. This is purely business. Sort of. Friendly business, but that's it.

Throughout the evening, they take two more selfies they're happy with: one in the kitchen, both without hats now, and Niall is bold enough to press a kiss to Zayn's cheek. Purely for credibility of course.

The second one happens when they relocate to Zayn's sofa to watch a movie. Zayn's got his hair down now, it looks soft and flowy where it falls to one side of his head, still showing off one shaved side. He's also loaned Niall a jumper (“Just pick one you like”, he said and Niall looked through a bunch of them before settling for a light blue one with QUIET printed in big letters on the chest) because it was starting to get a bit chilly in his long sleeve. They both look very cuddly, Niall reckons, and pulls up the camera on his phone, cuddling close to Zayn.

He seems to get it immediately and lets Niall, even wrapping his arm around him so his palm is resting flat on Niall's chest. Niall drops his head against Zayn's shoulder and takes a picture before sitting up and reluctantly putting some distance between them.

“Nice”, he says. “I'm putting this as my background like the sappy boyfriend I'd be.”

Zayn chuckles. “Alright, I'll put another one from the park today. I've got a couple of frames still lying around somewhere, I could have the two we're putting up developed tomorrow.”

“Or you could send them to me and I'll do it, I work next to a shop that develops photos quickly and quite cheap”, Niall suggests.

“Okay, great”, Zayn says, and Niall notices that neither of them have been paying attention to the film. “What time do you get off tomorrow? We should prepare before Perrie gets here.”

“Tomorrow's Friday…”, Niall thinks out loud. “I could be here around five, if that's okay?”

“Perfect”, Zayn smiles. “Thank you, Niall. You're way more invested in this than I ever could've expected from you.”

Niall smiles back at him. “No problem at all. It's fun! I've never pretend dated anyone but I love pulling pranks on people, and this is a bit like that, yeah?”

Niall's home much later than intended that night, but he's in a really good mood. His excitement might've been a bit premature, but he definitely wasn't wrong and he hopes tomorrow won't be the last evening they spend together. Hopefully Zayn will be up for becoming friends after this little game is over.

The next morning he leaves for work with a bigger bag than usual, but he's packed a change of clothes for tonight, his deodorant, a few knick knacks and a bottle of wine. He doesn't want to show up empty handed and it'd look weird if he was still wearing his work clothes when Perrie arrives.

The day goes by relatively quickly, he gets the photos and only one person asks him who the guy on his lock screen is. Niall lies and says it is his boyfriend, he doesn't feel like explaining the whole story. It also feels kinda good to have someone look impressed and jealous to equal parts when they say: “He's hot.”

At the tube station near Zayn's flat, he runs into Zayn.

“Hey”, he says, surprised, and Zayn smiles, kisses him on the cheek and then immediately apologises.

“I was just thinking about how we should probably get the whole casually touching thing down a bit more to be convincing but I haven't even asked you yet –“

“Zayn”, Niall interrupts, laughing and decidedly ignoring his heart that's picked up speed. “It's fine. We're not gonna fool anyone if you apologise every time you touch me.”

Zayn laughs too, nodding. “I'll try to remember that. What've you got in that bag?”

They start walking towards the flat while Niall explains and Zayn lifts his own bag when he's finished. “I bought a couple of things too, like a toothbrush and some hair products I don't use. It's likely she's gonna go to the bathroom while she's here so I thought I'd make it look more like two people used it.”

“Good thinking”, Niall compliments. “I also brought my sunglasses and two snapbacks to leave them lying around in the flat. Oh, and another pair of shoes and a jacket.”

Zayn smiles. “That's amazing. I bought a football magazine because you said you liked football? Saw it while I was waiting for the tube.”

Niall shakes his head and laughs. “She has to believe it now, at this rate I almost believe I'm dating you.”

Zayn lets them into the flat and jokingly says: “Welcome home, honey.”

Niall chuckles and starts placing his stuff all around the flat, shoes on the rack, jacket by the door, snapbacks and sunglasses on tables and the back of the sofa. Zayn puts up the photos while Niall is busy, and starts lining the bathroom with the products he bought, hanging up a second towel as well.

Niall joins him and washes his face twice to make the towel look halfway used, which makes Zayn laugh almost as much as when he pours way too much gel on his hands only to wash more than half it down the drain to make it look like the stuff isn’t freshly bought. He styles his hair a little and uses the aftershave Zayn bought as a sort of face cream, adding his own deodorant next to it. Lastly, he tries making the brand new toothbrush look used with his hands and some toothpaste.

“That's commitment”, Zayn laughs when he walks back into the bathroom. “I looked up a chicken korma recipe by the way, bought all the ingredients on the way home. I'll do anything you want to, if you do the actual cooking.”

“Sounds like a deal”, Niall winks. “You can chop everything.”

They're done with cooking – which was quite the fun experience, especially after they discovered that they sounded pretty good together singing along to the radio – just in time for Niall to change into the clothes he brought while Zayn sets the table.

When there's a knock on the door, Niall instinctively reaches for Zayn's hand, squeezing lightly. “We can do this.”

Zayn smiles at him gratefully and lets go to open the door Perrie. Niall watches as she kisses him on both cheeks in greeting and how stiff Zayn's shoulders go. He steps up to greet her too, letting his hand linger on Zayn’s lower back for a moment, before accepting Perrie’s hug.

“Dinner’s almost ready”, Niall says and Perrie sniffs the air curiously, so he adds: “We made chicken korma.”

Perrie big eyes grow even bigger. “You made it? As in, you actually cooked something? _Zayn_ did?”

“We’ve got this deal where I cook and he chops things and gets me ingredients”, Niall says easily. “It’s worked out quite well so far.”

Perrie throws him an impressed look and Zayn grabs his hand, entangling their fingers as if it’s something they do all the time, pulling him towards the table they’ve set. “You could stop bragging about how whipped you’ve got me and start serving the dinner, watching you make it has made me hungry”, he says and pulls a chair out for Perrie.

Niall chuckles to himself – they’re pulling every register here – and goes to get the food before sitting down next to Zayn, who smiles at him and starts serving.

“So, Niall, what do you do?” Perrie asks. “Besides cooking, that is. It smells divine, by the way.”

“Thank you”, Niall smiles. “And I’m a sound engineer and agent at Wall of Sound, that’s a small record label. I’m mainly responsible for guitar-heavy music and stuff, so I often spend my nights in pubs for open mic nights to see if I can spot some talent, and during the days I’m in the studio making sure they sound good on the actual record.”

“Wow, that sounds fascinating”, Perrie says. “Do you play guitar too?”

“Learned to when I was a kid”, Niall nods. “It’s what got me into the whole music business in the first place. I’d play you something but I left my guitar at the studio today.”

“That’s a shame, I would’ve loved to hear something.”

“He’s amazing”, Zayn pipes up and Niall glances at him quickly. He’s not even sure if he told Zayn he plays guitar. “Voice of an angel, this one, and he can play pretty much anything.”

“Now who’s bragging”, Niall mumbles, leaning over to press a quick kiss to Zayn’s cheek. Zayn smiles at him and for a moment Niall can’t look away. Something flutters in his stomach. But then Perrie coughs lightly, and Zayn and Niall both turn back to her with sheepish looks on their faces. She’s smiling though, looking down at her almost empty plate.

Conversation flows easily throughout the rest of dinner after that and Niall’s surprised by how many facts about each other he and Zayn can already slip in. They’re not too bad at the whole casual touching thing either, Zayn put his arm on the back rest of Niall’s chair when he was done with dinner and hasn’t really stopped playing with Niall’s hair or caressing the back of his neck since then. It’s highly distracting, but Niall tries not to let it show.

Perrie insists on helping him clear the table while Zayn gets the wine and pours it in the living room for the second part of the evening.

“Thanks for inviting me, Niall”, she says, once it’s just the two of them in the kitchen. “It’s really good to get to know you and see you with Zayn.” She leans closer to him, lowering her voice. “You know, when we broke up…I don’t think he felt the same way I did about our relationship. I was a bit worried about him, but he seems very happy with you. I’m glad he found someone who’s so good for him.”

Niall suddenly feels very uncomfortable, she’s just trying to be nice and looking out for Zayn, but it makes him feel bad about his role in this. He’s not actually helping Zayn to get over her after all, he’s just helping him pretend.

He smiles at her anyway and apparently it's convincing enough, because she squeezes his shoulder and then leaves the kitchen. Niall takes a deep breath, leaning against the kitchen counter for a minute before he follows her, ready to take on a couple of hours filled with small talk with his pretend boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend.

After Perrie leaves, Zayn visibly slumps, dropping down onto the sofa heavily. “I think we did it”, he says, but he doesn't sound all that happy.

Niall sits down next to him, touching his shoulder carefully in what he hopes is a comforting rub. “I know you probably don't want to hear this right now, but it'll get better eventually. One day you'll wake up and it won't hurt anymore.”

“I know it's stupid”, Zayn sighs deeply. “And I'm over it at least in the sense that I've stopped hoping she's gonna come back to me, I know she won't. But it's still hard.”

“I know it is, and that's completely normal. You don't just get over loving someone all easy and quick. Give it some time.”

“Thank you though, Niall”, Zayn says, and there's that sincere voice again. “You didn't have to help me but you jumped right in, even when I was just a stranger on the tube. And you've been so great, I can't thank you enough.“

“Again, it's fine”, Niall laughs. “You don't have to thank me, I had fun. We're a good team.”

Zayn smiles at that. “We are. And I know this is technically a breakup, but”, he chuckles a little, “I really hope we can stay friends.”

Niall laughs too. “Definitely. I'd love to be your friend.” He doesn't say how much he liked pretending to be Zayn's boyfriend though, because if he gets to be Zayn's friend that's already more than he could've expected. And who knows, maybe one day Zayn will be over Perrie and realise what a great boyfriend Niall was. A boy can dream. “Now, as the great friend I am, I'll help you do the dishes and then I'll go home because I'm very tired.”

“Bit late yesterday for a work night, right?” Zayn grins. “And I gotta be up tomorrow because my mum and sisters are coming for lunch.”

“Poor you”, Niall says, patting Zayn's shoulder once more and getting up. “Come on now, dishes.”

Zayn follows him into the kitchen and grabs a dish towel while Niall starts on the dirty dishes.

“My breakup with Perrie was pretty peaceful as far as breakups go, I'd say”, Zayn says after they've been quiet for a few minutes, “but this is by far the nicest one I've had so far.”

“You can make it sound more dramatic when you tell her about it”, Niall offers with a grin. “Make me sound like a right arse or something.”

“I don't think she'd believe that after an evening with you.” When Niall looks over at Zayn he's got a soft smile on his face. It makes Niall blush, for some reason. “You're a really good guy, Niall.”

“You're gonna blow up my ego with all of those compliments tonight”, Niall mumbles, trying to joke. “First the guitar skills you've never even witnessed and now this.”

“You just gotta show me how right or wrong I was one of these days. Although I reckon I wasn't too far off.”

“Shut up”, Niall says, but there's no edge to it. It’s probably a bad idea in his current situation, where he’s definitely crushing on his ex-pretend-boyfriend, but he’s enjoying Zayn complimenting him way too much to make a serious effort to stop him.

“I’ve got the rest”, Zayn says when Niall’s done with the dishes but there’s still a bit to dry. “You can head home, it’s late and you’ve done plenty.”

“Alright, boss.” Niall dries his hands and leans forward to kiss Zayn’s cheek for some strange (and probably masochistic) reason. “I’ll see you soon?”

“For sure“, Zayn smiles. „Get home safe, yeah?”

Niall’s out of the door with one last “Goodnight” and back at his flat within less than twenty minutes, feeling as if he’s about to fall asleep standing up. Zayn’s texted _Forgot your stuff here_ with a winky emoji sticking out its tongue, _did u get home safe ?_

 _All fine !_ Niall texts back between getting changed out of his clothes, _gona hafta pick it up soon then hahah_

He falls asleep what feels like a second after looking at Zayn’s reply, a thumbs up emoji and _Text me whenever u got time :) x_

The little kiss might be the reason for the smile on his face.

Niall wakes up to the insistent buzzing of his phone somewhere uncomfortably close to his face. He groans and opens his eyes wide enough to find he must've fallen asleep before putting his phone on his bedside table. Miraculously, it hasn't fallen down throughout the night and is instead ringing right next to his head on his pillow. With a call from none other than Zayn.

Still half asleep, he picks it up with a confused “Hello?”

“Niall, hi, sorry if I woke you up”, Zayn says, and he sounds…nervous? Stressed? “God I feel so bad for even doing this, but I've got a situation and…do you think you could play my boyfriend for one more day? My mum just called me from the train – I told you they were coming, right? – and said she met Perrie’s mum this morning who told her Perrie was over yesterday to meet you and basically I just told my mum you were my boyfriend.”

Niall is silent for a second, trying to gather his thoughts. “I haven't even showered yet.”

“You can do that here”, Zayn hurriedly offers. “Just…they're gonna be here in a bit over an hour and I told her you were just getting breakfast. Would you..?”

“Yeah,” Niall says. “Yeah, sure. I'll just grab some stuff and then I'll come over.”

“You're a saint”, Zayn sighs, sounding relieved. “I'll get us breakfast in the meantime.”

After he's hung up, Niall stares at his phone for a few seconds. The battery’s low so he needs to remember to bring his charger as well. Right. Pretending to be Zayn's boyfriend in front of his family can't be that much harder than for Perrie, right? He feels unsettled, a strange mixture of fear of lying to Zayn's family and excitement about getting to pretend to be his boyfriend for a little bit longer. He likes having an excuse to touch him excessively, so what.

He packs another bag, phone charger, change of clothes, phone and keys haphazardly thrown in, tugs on sweatpants and a t-shirt, and heads for Zayn's flat.

Zayn opens the door with ruffled hair, looking slightly frantic. “Thank you so much for this”, he says while Niall toes off his shoes. “I just couldn’t admit to her what it really was about. She’s been so worried about me and I felt kind of ashamed –“

Niall grabs Zayn’s face between both of his hands, looking him in the eyes. “All good, Zayn, relax. You can think of a story about how we met, and I’m gonna take a shower.” He lets go and walks towards the bathroom, calling over his shoulder: “Good thing I already have a towel!”

The toothbrush comes in handy as well, so does the hair gel. When he exits the bathroom dressed in jeans and a plaid shirt over his simple white t-shirt, Zayn’s in the kitchen with coffee and what looks to be a proper full English breakfast. Niall licks his lips and lifts his bunched up sweatpants. “I’ll just put those in your bedroom, alright?”

“Sure, you can put them on my bed or something. And then you can come have some of this breakfast I didn’t completely make on my own.”

Niall laughs and throws his sweats somewhere on Zayn’s bed, trying not to wonder what side Zayn sleeps on and if it’d match the one he usually sleeps on. “Which parts didn’t you make?”

“I just had to reheat the sausages”, Zayn admits, sitting down opposite Niall. “It’s a miracle I haven’t burned the beans or eggs, but I definitely would’ve burned the sausages.”

“Well, I appreciate the sentiment.”

“About our story”, Zayn says. “I was thinking we should stay as close to the truth as possible, so we met on the tube?”

“Fine with me, but we need more actual _story_ , something we can tell them”, Niall retorts. “Like, maybe you got on the tube and lost your balance when it took off. I was sitting there and you almost fell on my lap but I thought you were cute so I didn't mind.”

Zayn shrugs. “Sure, let's go with that.”

“Well you're easily convinced”, Niall jokes. “Gotta remember that for when I ever need anything.”

“If you use that against me in front of my mum, you're officially the worst fake boyfriend ever”, Zayn threatens jokingly. “You won't get a good rating from me.”

“Aw”, Niall mock pouts. “There goes my rating on getyourpretendbf.co.uk.”

Zayn laughs. “Idiot.”

“You started it”, Niall accuses him and suddenly Zayn's got him in a headlock, surprising him enough to be completely unprepared. He splutters and struggles enough for Zayn to let him go, then points a finger at him. “You're damn lucky I was done with breakfast, Malik.”

“Oh yeah?” He says it so provokingly that Niall really has no choice but to go after him this time.

Zayn is better prepared though and manages to escape, running away and laughing at Niall. They chase each other through Zayn's way too small living room and Niall isn't sure how it happened or why they're doing it, but he's having too much fun to stop.

He manages to trip Zayn so he topples down onto the sofa but before he can use this to his advantage, there's a knock on the door.

Zayn immediately freezes and stops laughing. “Alright”, he says. “That's them. You remember their names?” Niall nods. “Great. Let's get this show on the road, then.”

They get the door together and there's Zayn's mum, obviously, and his three sisters. All of them are as beautiful as Zayn, so it's gotta be a family thing.

Trisha takes one look at them and smiles knowingly. “Sorry, are we early? Did we interrupt anything?”

“No, mum”, Zayn blushes and Niall glances at him and realises that, okay, they probably both look a bit dishevelled. “We were just done with breakfast. This is Niall. Niall, my mum and sisters.”

“Hi”, Niall says. “It's so nice to meet you, Zayn has told me a lot about you.”

“It's lovely to meet you too, Niall.” Zayn's mum steps closer and pulls Niall in for a hug and he hugs her back surprisedly.

As they enter the flat, Niall greets both of Zayn's sisters by name, Safaa, the smallest one, and Waliyha, who's more of a young woman than a girl. “Doniya didn't want to come?” he asks.

“She's busy at home”, Waliyha says. “Got work and her husband and stuff.”

„You'll get to know her soon enough”, Trisha smiles and Niall looks around for Zayn but he's escaped to the kitchen to make them tea. “You're coming to Zayn's father’s birthday party the weekend after next, of course?”

That gives her Niall's full attention back immediately. “Oh no, I couldn't –“ he tries, but Trisha shushes him.

“Nonsense, we would've invited you if Zayn hadn't kept you all to himself this long. You've got to come.”

And it's like, Niall could feign work or something to get out of this, but there's this voice in his head telling him if he says yes he’ll get to play Zayn's boyfriend for longer. _He might realise how well you fit together as boyfriends_ , it says.

“Well, if you insist…”, is what eventually comes out and all the Malik women beam at him.

“It's so exciting to get to know you, Niall”, Trisha says. “We only found out Zayn even was in a relationship this morning when Perrie's mother told us at the station that Perrie was here last night.”

“I would've told you, mum”, Zayn groans from where he's carrying their tea into the living room. “Don't sound so offended, we just preferred to keep our relationship between us so far.”

“No one knows?” Waliyha asks.

“No, some of our friends do”, Zayn frowns. “Harry, and Niall's friends Liam and Louis.”

“How long have you been dating for?” Safaa asks curiously and Niall remembers with a start that they haven’t made that clear.

“Uh, about four months now, right babe?” Zayn asks and Niall nods and smiles at him.

“Yeah, it’s gotta be somewhere around that now.”

Trisha frowns at her son. “And you never thought to bring him around? We were all starting to worry you were still hung up on Perrie.”

“That’s my fault, actually”, Niall pipes up, noticing how Zayn’s shoulders stiffen at the mention of Perrie’s name. “I asked Zayn to keep it low key, but we were about to change that anyway. This is quite good timing.” No one looks really convinced but Zayn hands out the tea he made and distracts them sufficiently with questions about life back home so Niall thinks they’re more or less safe for now.

They spend the rest of the morning at Zayn’s flat and then head out for lunch, all the Malik women insisting Niall come along.

They go to an Italian restaurant they've apparently been going to since Zayn moved to London almost ten years ago and order before Zayn's mum turns to Niall (and Zayn, who's sat right next to him) again. “So, I have to ask this since I couldn't help but notice a few things when I went to the bathroom before we left: do you already live together?”

“Oh, not really”, Niall says. “But I stay over quite often because Zayn lives alone and I have a flatmate.”

“Do you not get along?”

“Nothing's wrong with Liam, mum, he's our friend”, Zayn explains, looking embarrassed. Niall really likes the fact that Zayn remembers Liam’s name. “It's just nice to have some privacy sometimes.”

“Ohhhhh”, Waliyha sing-songs, drawn out, and Safaa wriggles her eyebrows knowingly.

“Shut up”, Zayn snaps while Niall tries hiding behind the coke he ordered. The worst part is that this is embarrassing without anything to be embarrassed about, except maybe how Niall wishes their assumptions were true. He thinks he'd be far too happy to feel embarrassed if he and Zayn were actually having sex.

“Sorry”, Trisha says. “I didn't mean to embarrass you two or anything, I just saw you had a toothbrush and all those toiletries and your clothes around the flat…and since we didn't even know you existed until a few hours ago I guess I just thought it might as well be even more Zayn hasn't told us.”

“I'm sorry for keeping it a secret, mum”, Zayn says, teeth gritted. “It has nothing to do with you though.”

“Sorry, sorry”, she repeats and Niall feels very bad for causing this suddenly.

Zayn looks over at him and frowns, reaching for his hand. “And it's not your fault, please stop frowning.” He reaches up with his free hand to smooth out the wrinkles in Niall's forehead, making him smile. “That's better.”

“No, sweetheart”, Trisha reaches across the table for Niall's other hand. “I'm not blaming you, I'm just being a terribly curious mum who can't deal with her little boy growing up.”

Zayn whines “muuuum” and Niall laughs, squeezing both of their hands. “I'm glad we cleared this up.” Zayn is also very good at playing the caring boyfriend, and Niall is glad about that too.

The rest of lunch passes with interrogating Niall about his job, his music and Ireland (“My mum was Irish!” Trisha exclaims. “We didn't fly over often but she was always proud of her nationality.”) and it's very nice, funny even. Niall's really enjoying it, almost as much as Zayn's hand brushing his arm or neck or the back of his head every so often.

Safaa and Waliyha are just as curious as their mum and ask vaguely intrusive questions that both Niall and Zayn dodge if possible, which doesn't even seem suspicious because Niall would definitely do it even if Zayn really was his boyfriend.

They tell the story of how they supposedly met on the tube, after Safaa almost loses her balance and Niall starts the story with: “Must be in the family…”

Both girls think it's a hilarious story and won't stop teasing their brother throughout the whole ride. Niall laughs with them and wishes it was true.

On their walk from the tube station back to the flat, Safaa cheerfully links arms with Niall. “I'm so glad we're already seeing you again in two weeks!” she says.

“Sorry, what?” It's Zayn, walking on Niall's other side, fingers linked between them.

“For dad’s birthday”, Waliyha explains, rolling her eyes at Zayn's slowness. “We invited him since you obviously forgot.”

Niall gives him an apologetic smile and a one-shouldered shrug, but Zayn just squeezes his hand. “Yeah, of course, I just didn't know…”

“Yeah, yeah, secret boyfriend and all that”, Safaa sighs and Niall chuckles. He really likes Zayn's sisters.

Niall and the girls watch a movie then, one of the few romcoms Zayn owns, while Zayn and his mum have another cup of tea in the kitchen. After they finish it, Niall remembers his dead phone and goes to plug it in, Waliyha next to him telling him about something one of her professors said.

“Have you told anyone about this?” he asks, frowning at her. “That seems to be some pretty misogynist crap, not cool.”

“I've talked about it with some girls in that class and we want to tell someone, but we're still trying to get proof on it.”

“That's reasonable”, Niall nods. “Let me know how it goes, yeah?”

“Sure”, she smiles and looks down at Niall's phone screen lighting up. “Aw!” she exclaims, looking at his lock screen, the picture of him and Zayn “cuddling”. “That's so cute, oh my god. What's Zayn's background?”

“I'm not even sure”, Niall lies and Waliyha grins, skipping off to the kitchen.

“Zayn!” she yells. “Show me your phone!”

“What?” Niall hears Zayn ask. “Why?”

He must've given it to her anyway though, because her voice is back right away. “Aw man, that's cute too. It's from the same day as the one on your bookshelf, right? When did you take it?”

“I'm not sure, a couple of weeks ago? Niall had them developed for our anniversary.”

“You're really cute.” Niall jumps, it's Safaa talking right next to him, watching him with a smile. “I mean, you two together are cute and it's even cuter how you're smiling right now, when you don't even see him.”

Niall blushes. He definitely hasn't been acting for the past few minutes.

Zayn, Trisha and Waliyha come back to the living room and Zayn walks up to Niall, wrapping an arm around his waist and pressing a kiss to his cheek quickly. “Safaa bothering you?”

“Nah, we were just talking”, Niall says and wraps one arm around Zayn too, using this opportunity to keep him close.

“We should be heading home soon, girls” Trisha says, checking her purse. “Have you got everything?” She turns to Niall with a warm smile, pulling him into a hug. “It was so nice to meet you, Niall. I can't wait to see you again next weekend.”

“Thank you for inviting me”, Niall smiles. “It was lovely meeting you too.”

Zayn's sisters both hug him and Zayn too, and then they're out the door.

“I'm so sorry, I didn't know how to tell them no”, is the first thing Niall says once they're alone.

“Tell them no to what?” Zayn asks.

“Uh…your dad's birthday?”

“Oh yeah, that…” Zayn looks sheepish. “I'm the one who's sorry, I can tell them something came up at work if you're busy next Saturday. Or you know, don't wanna come.”

“I'm not busy.” _And I like getting to be your boyfriend._

“God, I'm so sorry”, Zayn groans. “I keep dragging you deeper and deeper into my shit, I feel really bad.”

“I don't mind going to your dad's birthday with you”, Niall repeats and Zayn nods.

“Thank you. So much. I just…Harry’s invited as well, I think you should probably meet him before, just so you don't seem like complete strangers.”

“We can make a lad’s night of it”, Niall suggests. “You and Harry come over and Liam and I invite Louis as well, it'll be fun.” Then, before Zayn can say anything, Niall face palms. “Shit, Liam. I completely forgot about him, I never told him where I was going today.”

He hurries back to his phone that's received all of the notifications from when it was dead now. Liam’s texted him a couple of times and even called once.

_where r u??_

_just got home frm louis and your still gonnnneeee_

_niall did u stay the night????_

_u better tell me everythingggg when ur back!!!!_

“Shit”, Niall mumbles and texts back _I'll explain when I'm home but I went bck t zayns this morning its a long story !_

“Everything alright?” Zayn asks.

“Yeah, Liam just asked what happened to me.”

“Do you have to go home?”

“Should probably go and explain, like. I think he was worried.”

“Alright”, Zayn nods. “Let's figure out a date for that lad’s night soon, yeah?”

They hug goodbye and it takes Niall until he's on the tube to start wondering if Zayn's question if he had to go meant he wanted him to stay.

Liam’s waiting for him in their kitchen, arms crossed and eyebrows lifted. “So?” he asks. “What's this all about?”

Niall groans. “Hello to you, too. It's really not what you think right now.”

“Are you still pretend dating the hot guy from the tube?”

“His name is Zayn and…yeah, sorta.”

“How can you sort of pretend date someone?” Liam asks doubtfully.

“Things got a bit out of hand”, Niall mumbles. “Can we sit down? I'll explain.”

It takes him almost an hour to tell Liam everything that's happened within the past two days, especially since Liam keeps interrupting him with uncomfortable questions (“So you just said yes, you didn't even think about saying you were busy?”).

“This is crazy Niall, you know that right? It's like straight out of some film”, Liam says when he's finished.

“I know, and you already told me that when I first met Zayn. But even if it's weird and I'm gonna feel really bad for lying to his family, it's a bit late to back out now, isn't it?”

“You could still say something came up at work, you constantly work nights. Say you got assigned an open mic night or something.” Liam looks pretty unrelenting but Niall's not gonna change his mind, he knows that. He's already in way too deep.

“I'm…what would that change though? We've already started lying, can just go through with it for one more week and then fake a breakup in a couple of weeks. Off-screen for them obviously.”

“In the end this is your decision”, Liam sighs. “I just hope you’ve thought this through, Nialler.”

Niall thinks that thinking anything through isn’t really an option anymore, but he doesn’t say that. Instead, he drops the topic and only brings it up again later that night to ask if Liam and Louis are up for a lad’s night one day during the next week, which they are.

Niall manages to avoid the whole topic for a couple of days, until the day they’re supposed to all meet up at Niall and Liam’s flat. He has no idea how it works because him and Zayn constantly text and Liam definitely catches him at it, but he doesn’t bring it up again.

Louis’ already over anyway, bothering Liam who’s trying to get their snacks and drinks sorted out in the kitchen, the night Zayn and Harry are supposed to come over. Niall tries to look like he isn’t terribly nervous while he tidies their living room and even his own room, not that either of them were very messy in the first place. Him and Liam are pretty tidy for two guys living alone. He doesn’t even know what he’s nervous for, maybe that Zayn won’t like his friends or they won’t like him. Or that Liam will ask Zayn embarrassing questions or give his stupid crush away.

He should probably talk to Liam about that again but he doesn’t trust the bickering he hears from the kitchen. Last time he walked in on them without knocking he thought they were fighting but it turned out they were actually doing pretty much the opposite. Not a sight he needs to repeat, and they really don’t have enough stuff to take this long with getting them out.

Louis’ hair does look suspiciously rumpled when he exits the kitchen towards the bathroom – twisting Niall’s nipple on the way there (“Hey!” Niall exclaims but he’s long since learned that there’s no safety from Louis) – but at least it means the coast is clear.

“Liam?” he asks, joining his flatmate in the small kitchen. There’s crisps and cupcakes Louis must’ve brought, some popcorn and crackers, beer, coke and water on the counter. “Can I talk to you for a sec?”

“Yeah, sure. What is it, Nialler?”

“Are we really serving just beer tonight?” is what Niall blurts out instead.

“We agreed on that, remember?” Liam asks sternly, crossing his arms. “It’s a work night –“

“Yeah, yeah, sorry”, Niall interrupts. “I actually…I didn’t want to talk about the beer. I – Can you just please not tell Zayn I said he’s beautiful or whatever? Please?”

Liam laughs. “So I’m not supposed to tell your pretend boyfriend you’ve got a crush on him? I sort of figured that, mate.”

“Okay”, Niall nods, wiping across his face with one hand. “Okay, good.”

“What are you nervous for?” Liam sounds concerned again and it makes Niall grit his teeth. “It’ll be alright.”

Louis chooses this moment to come back and Niall glares at him and leaves. He can hear them talk hushedly and it only serves to make his mood even worse.

“Aw, Nialler”, Louis starts and Niall turns around with a glare, even though he knows he’s bad at looking angry.

“Shut up”, he grits anyway, but Louis doesn’t listen, coming closer and throwing an arm around Niall’s shoulders.

“We’re on your side here”, he says. “If there even is such a thing. We’ll keep your secret, we aren’t here to interfere. We just want to get to know this bloke that’s gotten you to play his boyfriend.”

“Be nice”, Niall warns, because there’s a knock on their door exactly that moment.

He opens the door and Zayn is there, wearing a leather jacket and a band shirt, looking too good to pass for a real person. Behind him must be Harry, and he's even taller than on the pictures in Zayn's flat. His hair is also at least twice as long.

“Hey”, Niall says and Zayn smiles while Harry waves at him dopily. “Come in.”

“It's so exciting to meet you”, Harry says and Niall remembers that Zayn told him Harry talked slower than most people. It seems to be true. “When Zayn told me about the situation I felt as if I'd been catapulted into one of my favourite movies.”

“Imagine what it feels like for me”, Niall laughs.

“Right, I'm just the trusty sidekick, it's gotta be even stranger for you.”

Niall glances at Zayn quickly. “Well, it's definitely the first time I've ever pretend dated anyone.”

He introduces everyone and announces they've ordered pizza to go with the beer and snacks. The delivery guy seems to hear him because he arrives right after and when Niall gets back with the food after paying the other four already seem to be the best of friends. They're spread out across his and Liam's sofas, talking excitedly about what seems to be FIFA, even though Liam and Louis are obviously much more into it than Zayn and Harry. They're happily teasing each other though, and Niall gets a floaty feeling in his chest.

“I just like people”, Harry says, “and I like interacting with people and preferably not through some sort of machine.”

“We're literally sat next to each other when we play it, Harold”, Louis protests and ignores Harry muttering “That's not my name”. Zayn and Niall however snort when Liam sings “they call me Stacy, they call me her” quietly and look at each other for a moment. Zayn pats the space next to him on the sofa invitingly and Niall sits gladly.

“I’m glad we’re doing this”, he says and Niall nods.

“Me too, Harry seems really nice.”

“He wasn’t lying when he said he was excited to meet you, you know”, Zayn grins and Niall grins back, not too sad about the fact that the sofa is small enough with Liam on it too so that their thighs are pressed closely together.

“You two!” Louis interrupts them before Niall can say anything, pointing at them. “Stop flirting, we’re gonna play FIFA now.”

He shushes Niall when he tries to protest, stating that a) they’re not flirting, and b) they’re five people. Louis doesn’t care and puts them in teams, telling Harry he gets to be cheerleader because he probably sucks at playing anyway.

“Heyyy”, Harry makes, but Zayn laughs quietly and whispers in Niall’s ear that Harry’s even worse than he is.

Zayn isn’t so bad though, Niall discovers when Louis puts them on the same team which means that each of them gets to play one halftime. If only Zayn wasn’t so close, and if he wasn’t so into excitedly squeezing any body part of Niall’s he can reach, maybe Niall would be able to show how good _he_ actually is at the game. This way though, he keeps getting distracted by the little touches or Zayn’s breath tickling his neck when he leans in to whisper Louis’ or Liam’s weaknesses in his ear.

When Harry gets too bored as cheerleader they decide to stop and watch a movie instead. Surprisingly, the first one they can agree on is Grease, which ends in a big singalong that’s not half-bad. It’s definitely fun.

No one wants to sit on the floor while they watch, so it’s a bit of a tight fit on the sofas even though they’ve got two of them, but Liam and Louis take the loveseat, which leaves Harry, Zayn and Niall on the only slightly bigger sofa. Niall spends half of the time curled up into Zayn’s side and he doesn’t mind at all, not when Zayn’s fingers playing with the hair at the nape of his neck feel so nice.

Harry and Zayn stay long enough for them to finish all of the snacks Liam had opened and for all of them to lounge around with droopy eyes, but when they leave it’s only because all of them have work in the morning, not because they ran out of things to talk about.

Louis stays a few minutes longer, mostly to snog Liam and make Niall feel uncomfortable while he picks up the empty bottles they left lying around, but he eventually leaves too.

Niall’s in the bathroom brushing his teeth when Liam joins him, an expression on his face that is so carefully neutral that Niall expects nothing good.

“So”, he says, looking at Niall in the mirror. “You and Zayn seem awfully cosy.”

Niall shrugs, trying to act nonchalant. “We’re friends.”

“Friends who cuddle and touch a lot”, Liam corrects. “Don’t get me wrong, I like Zayn from what I’ve seen today. But are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

 _No_. “Yes. Don't worry about me, Liam.”


	2. the falling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im posting this a bit early because i finished writing it earlier than expected, so yay :) i don’t own any of the boys obviously, and this is purely fictional  
> im on [tumblr](http://www.kissingziall.tumblr.com) :)

The rest of the week passes quickly between work and spending more time with Liam, Zayn, Harry and Louis. It's fun when it's all five of them, they get along like a house on fire. The weekend goes by too quickly as well, with an open mic night – technically for work – that he goes to with Willie and Bressie, and a movie night at Zayn’s with the lads. Work is busy the next week but he still lets Harry drag him along to a shopping trip that turns out to be a tour through London’s thrift shops, it seems, because Harry needs “a fresh opinion, Niall”, as he’d whined.

And then it's Saturday morning and Niall, Harry and Zayn are on the train to Bradford.

“So you've met everyone but Doniya and Yaser, right?” Harry asks and waits for Niall to nod. “They’ll love you. Now, I’m not sure about Zayn’s aunt and uncles, but they hated Perrie too so I wouldn’t worry.”

Niall looks over at Zayn to have Harry’s story verified and Zayn nods with a half-shrug. “Guess they always wanted me to marry a good Muslim girl eventually.”

“Will they have a problem with me being a guy?” Niall asks, suddenly nervous. What if Zayn’s extended family is really old fashioned?

“Yeah, most likely.” Zayn looks confusingly relaxed about that part and Harry laughs at Niall’s face.

“You should know that Zayn does not care at all about what the stuck up part of his family thinks”, he explains.

“I do care”, Zayn protests. “I just keep hoping that eventually, they’ll get used to our generation being more open minded. They gotta accept that the world is changing at some point.”

“Zayn once kissed me in front of them just to prove a point”, Harry says conversationally and Zayn snorts.

“We were 13”, he adds.

“I mean, I get it”, Niall says. “I’ve got this one uncle who kept asking me if I had a girlfriend yet even long after he knew I was gay so I started telling him about all the guys I had crushes on really obnoxiously.”

“Wait, so you actually are gay?”

Niall takes a double take at Harry. “Um”, he makes. “I  _am_  currently playing Zayn's boyfriend, you know.”

“Yeah but that's it, you're just playing. We thought that you were just a really tolerant guy, you know? Because of Liam and Louis.”

“Wait, you thought so too?” Niall turns to Zayn. “Or was that the royal ‘we’?”

“You just said you didn't mind me being a guy”, Zayn defends himself. “I didn't know for sure.”

Niall laughs. “Well, now you know.” Both Zayn and Harry seem a little embarrassed so he takes pity and changes the subject. “How long have you two been friends, then?”

“Since we were, like, eight?” Zayn says. “A very long time, at least.”

“Drove our parents a little crazy occasionally“, Harry grins. “Like, when we were kids, but even more when we got older. Snuck out to get our first tattoos and stuff. Still don't know how we convinced the artist we were old enough.”

“It was your dimples”, Zayn says. “Works on everyone.”

They pass a huge chunk of the time like that, telling Niall stories about what they got up to as children and teenagers, giving him information on family members and childhood friends he should've heard of. Not long before they arrive in Manchester, the first station they have to change trains at, Zayn falls asleep. His head comes to rest against Niall's shoulder, and Niall tries desperately not to look as endeared as he feels because Harry is still sitting opposite them. It's really cute though, Zayn makes little snuffling noises every now and then and looks adorable, and Niall's heart does the fluttery thing again.

He blushes when Harry just raises his eyebrows at him and realises that he's been staring.

“It's a bit unfair, innit?” Harry asks. “How he still looks like this when he's asleep.”

“A little, yeah.” There's nothing wrong with him objectively appreciating Zayn's looks, not with a face like that. Doesn't mean he's got a crush or anything.

Harry is still watching him attentively and Niall doesn't like it one bit. “What?” he asks.

“Nothing”, Harry says unconvincingly. “Just wondering why a guy like you would sacrifice his weekend for pretending to be someone’s boyfriend in a situation he could've easily gotten out of.”

“I couldn't say no when they were looking at me like that!” Niall protests and attempts changing the subject. “And what do you mean, ‘a guy like me’?”

“Fit, young, single”, Harry explains. “You could probably walk into a club and just pick a guy. Instead you come visit Zayn's family with us.”

“I like spending time with you guys.” Niall knows that's a weak argument, but he feels backed into a corner. “Maybe I just don't feel like anonymously hooking up right now?”

“And why's that?” Harry asks, eyes not so subtly flicking from Niall to Zayn.

Niall's had enough. Why is everyone always trying to make him uncomfortable? “We're almost in Manchester, we should get ready.” It's a poor attempt of ending their conversation but Niall busies himself with trying to wake up Zayn and ignores Harry for the time it takes to transfer.

Harry and Zayn talk about Harry taking the last train back to Manchester tonight to sleep at his mum and stepdad’s house because the Malik house is apparently gonna be crowded enough as it is. Niall doesn’t say much and when they’re in Leeds to transfer another time, Zayn looks at him while they’re walking next to each other. “You alright?” he asks. “You’ve been quiet.”

“Fine”, Niall shrugs. “Trains make me sleepy.”

“Just…” Zayn hesitates. “You don’t have to be nervous or anything. My aunts and uncles won’t say anything. That might’ve sounded worse than it is earlier.”

Niall smiles at him. “Thank you, I’m not nervous though, not really. Got nothing to lose, I guess.”

Zayn looks at him thoughtfully for a moment. “I guess.”

It doesn’t take long for the train to take them from Leeds to Bradford, and then they’re at the station, heading towards a woman who Niall thinks must be Doniya. Zayn and Harry both hug her and then Zayn places one hand on Niall’s shoulder lightly, edging him closer to his sister. “Doniya, this is Niall.”

“Hi”, she smiles warmly. “It’s nice to finally meet you. Mum and the girls have been talking about nothing else for the past weeks.”

Niall laughs awkwardly and accepts her hug. He suddenly realises that he’s been lying to Zayn and is actually incredibly nervous to meet his family, and having already gotten over it with Doniya doesn’t really help. Someone’s gotta see through them, someone’s gonna find out and call them out. And he’s gonna break their hearts. It does have its downsides that he and Zayn's family get along so well already.

The drive to the Malik family home doesn't take long in Doniya’s car, and she doesn't ask them much beyond how their journey was. At the house, Niall barely has time to get out of the car before he has an armful of girl, Safaa hugging him as if it hasn't been just two weeks since they saw each other. With a laugh he hugs her back, spotting Harry and Waliyha in a similar position nearby.

When the sisters switch then, Waliyha coming up to Niall while Safaa greets Harry, Zayn snorts. “My own sisters prefer my boyfriend and my best friend over me, wow.”

“It’s a tough life, Zayn”, Waliyha and goes to hug him too. “Glad you made it. Mum’s been getting impatient.”

“Why?” Zayn asked, genuinely baffled. “We’re perfectly on time.”

“Think she missed Niall”, Safaa laughs, linking her arm with Niall’s and pulling him towards the front door. “You too, Harry. Maybe.”

Harry looks offended and runs inside first, calling: “Trisha! Where’s my favourite second mum?”

Niall grins as Trisha comes out of what’s probably the kitchen, huge smile on her face, and pulls Harry into her arms. “Harry, my love”, she says. “I’ve missed you.”

“Missed you too, Trish”, Harry grins. “Look who I brought.”

“Welcome, sweetheart”, is what Niall gets in greeting, along with a warm hug.

She greets Zayn with a kiss to his cheek. “Hello, sunshine. Glad you’re here.”

“Of course, mum. Is dad in?”

“Yes, he's in the lounge I think”, Trisha says. “You can tell him that lunch is almost ready.”

“I'll let him know.” He reaches for Niall's hand with a smile. “Come on, babe, meet my dad.”

Harry’s gone ahead already, leaving the lounge as Niall and Zayn enter it. “I'm gonna help set the table”, he announces and pats the man in the middle of the room on the shoulder.

Niall lets go of Zayn's hand and gets an amused look for it but he suddenly feels as if he's really meeting his boyfriend's father. Yaser Malik doesn't really look intimidating per se, but he's fixing Niall with an inquisitive gaze that makes him nervous. He can see the resemblance to Zayn who seems to have gotten a good mixture of his parents’ genes, and there's grey streaking his dark hair, but he doesn't look like a man turning sixty.

Zayn hugs him hello and Niall likes seeing it, has experienced plenty of men awkwardly shaking their father’s hands and is happy this doesn't seem to be an issue with Zayn and his dad.

“Dad, meet Niall”, Zayn says and Niall steps forward, smiles and extends his hand.

“Hi, Mr Malik, it's nice to meet you. Oh, and happy birthday!”

“Thank you, Niall.” His grip on Niall's hand is strong, and Niall is relieved he's always had a rather good handshake. The inquisitive look is still there though, and Niall smiles nervously. “I've heard nothing but good things about you from my wife and daughters”, Mr Malik continues. “But I can't say the same thing about my son.”

“Dad”, Zayn groans. “Please stop trying to make either of us feel guilty, mum’s already done plenty of that last weekend. Just accept that I haven't told you everything about my life over the past few months, okay? Now you know.”

“Don’t make a habit of it”, Mr Malik warns. “You’re making your mother worry.”

“Alright, dad”, Zayn sighs. “I’ll keep you updated from now on. And mum says lunch is almost ready.”

“Zayn!” Trisha calls from the kitchen, and all three men in the living room turn towards the door. “Go and show Niall your bedroom, will you? You’ll be sleeping there, take your luggage upstairs.”

“My bedroom?” Zayn asks and walks back to the kitchen, leaning against the doorframe and checking over his shoulder if Niall is following him. He is. “We’re both sleeping in there?”

“I know the bed’s a bit small”, Trisha says apologetically and Niall feels heat rise to his face. They’ll be sharing a  _bed_? “The rest of the house is full though, Waliyha and Safaa are already sharing. And don’t pretend as if you don’t usually share a bed.”

Zayn looks appropriately embarrassed and Niall is pretty sure he looks terribly uncomfortable as well, but Zayn manages to shrug. “Alright, we’ll manage.”

Trisha smiles. “I’m sure you will. Don’t take too long, lunch is almost ready.”

Niall follows as Zayn leads him up the stairs and into a room that reminds him a lot of his own childhood room, superhero posters on the wall, comics on the shelves, stacks of CDs. It’s funny to see they’ve left Zayn’s room this way almost a decade after he’s moved out. Niall’s room back at his dad’s house has long since been turned into a study with a bed for guests.

“Sorry about that”, Zayn says, looking over at the admittedly kind of small bed. “I didn’t realise we’d be sleeping in here.”

“It’s okay”, Niall says, even though there’s a tug somewhere in his stomach at the thought of sharing this bed with Zayn. “Unless you’re uncomfortable with it, I could sleep on the floor for a night or something.”

“No, no! Of course not, I just thought  _you_  might be uncomfortable.”

Niall laughs a little. “It’s not the first time I’ve shared a bed with a bloke, Zayn. And it’s not  _that_  small.”

Zayn nods. “Great. Besides, we’ll probably be too tired to worry about anything like that when we get back tonight anyway. We’re gonna have to dance.”

“Oh?” Niall asks, delighted. “On a proper dancefloor? I can’t do much more than swaying and attempting to waltz, but I’m in.”

“I’m a terrible dancer”, Zayn chuckles. “But I’m sure it’ll be fun. My family is big on dancing when there’s anything to celebrate and we wouldn’t be able to escape them either way, but with us being so new to them they’ll be even more curious.”

“Should we practice, then?” It’s meant as a joke, but Zayn grins and takes a step forward, reaching for Niall’s hand and placing the other one at his hip. Niall looks at him, surprised, but places his free hand on Zayn’s shoulder anyway. “Alright, then.”

Zayn starts humming and sways them a little, making Niall chuckle but play along. “That all you got, Malik?” he teases, and there’s a glint in Zayn’s eyes that makes him worry suddenly.

They speed up and Zayn twirls them around the minimal open space of his room, grinning. “This is what you get from challenging me, Horan.”

Suddenly, he dips Niall who lets out a loud yelp, clinging to Zayn’s shoulders. “Don’t you dare drop me!”

Zayn grins devilishly and lowers him even further, but then a look of surprise crosses his face and he loses his balance, toppling over. It’s not a far fall to the floor but he lands half on top of Niall, and they’re both laughing too hard to move.

“You idiot”, Niall laughs, pushing at Zayn’s shoulder.

“It’s all your fault”, Zayn grins, pinning Niall’s wrist to the floor so he stops pushing him.

“Oh”, someone says and Zayn lets go of Niall immediately, both of them looking towards the door. Safaa is stood there, looking down at them with a wide smile on her face. “I didn’t want to interrupt anything, but mum sent me to get you. Lunch is ready.”

“Thanks, Saf”, Zayn says. “We’ll be down in a minute.” He sits up and offers Niall a hand to help him up. “Oops?”

Niall laughs and shakes his head. “Good timing, more like. She’ll probably tell someone else and before long everyone will assume we were passionately making out on your bedroom floor.” He doesn’t say what kind of thoughts Zayn on top of him, pinning his wrist down, have brought on.

Downstairs, they sit down next to each other at the table where everyone’s already waiting for them, and Niall sniffs appreciatively. It’s been a while since he had breakfast.

“So”, Harry says, obviously taking it on himself to satisfy the general curiosity that’s almost tangible in the room. “Safaa tells some interesting stories. What were you doing on the floor?”

Niall blushes, can’t help it, but he supposes it fits the role he’s playing. “We were dancing”, he shrugs sheepishly. “And when Zayn dipped me, we fell.”

“I could’ve held him, obviously”, Zayn says. “I just thought it was funny to drop Niall, but he pulled me with him.”

“Keep telling yourself that”, Niall laughs, and he doesn’t even have to act. “I saw your face when you lost your balance.”

“I’m a great actor”, Zayn huffs.

“Sure, babe”, Niall says and leans forward to kiss his cheek. He’s a pretty shit actor usually, but then again he’s not acting as much as Zayn thinks he is.

Everyone is watching them of course, and when Niall looks back to them, they’re all displaying different stages of endearment, even Yaser is shaking his head fondly. Niall blushes again and looks down at his plate that’s already been loaded with delicious smelling food.

“Believe me”, Harry says with a grin, “you think this is cute now, but it does get old watching them for too long. Nauseating, really.”

Safaa and Waliyha giggle and Niall focuses on the food in front of him, intending to look as embarrassed as possible.

“Harry”, Zayn says loudly, “why don't you tell my family what you've been up to? They're probably curious.”

“Yes, love”, Trisha says, genuinely interested. “We've got some catching up to do!”

Harry beams and launches into one of his long winded stories, and just like that Niall and Zayn are off the hook.

They finish lunch and then Trisha and Yaser leave for the venue they're holding the party at, together with plenty of boxes filled with food, while the rest is left behind to do the dishes. Doniya hasn't stayed for lunch but there's still five of them, so they're done pretty quickly.

Harry, Zayn and Niall go upstairs afterwards to pass the time until they have to leave too, and Harry turns to grin at them as soon as Zayn has closed the door.

“Nice story about the dancing, you even convinced me with that one”, he says. “What were you really doing on the floor though?”

“Uh”, Niall makes and looks over at Zayn awkwardly. “We actually…the dancing story wasn't made up.”

“What were you dancing for?” Harry asks incredulously.

“It was practice, for tonight”, Zayn explains.

Harry laughs. “Well that can't have gone very well if you ended up on the floor.”

“It was Zayn's fault! He thought he should dip me but then he wasn't strong enough to hold me.”

“It had nothing to do with strength”, Zayn protests. “I maybe misjudged the angle a bit or something but that's it.”

“Whatever makes you sleep at night.”

Harry is watching them with wide, questioning eyes and Niall pretends not to see the raised eyebrows Zayn gets from him. He knows Harry is trying to communicate that they're acting like a bickering couple even when no one's around to see, but it's easier to ignore that than to actually face what it might mean. So he makes a show of getting his bag and rummaging through it, trying to find an outfit for the party. He's brought several, loser that he is.

“So what's a boy gotta wear to impress your family?”

Zayn steps next to him. “Let me see what you've got.”

They settle on the black and white chequered button up shirt Niall brought, while Zayn's choosing an all black one. They're both wearing black skinny jeans and match nicely while Harry stands out in his slightly weird floral patterned shirt.

“You look like a proper couple”, he says appreciatively. “No one's gonna doubt you, you've got the whole act down.”

“Well, that is the intention after all”, Zayn teases. “But thanks for the vote of confidence.”

“I wonder if everybody thinks you're gonna have sex in your tiny little childhood bed tonight”, Harry says and Niall blushes violently. That's not an image he needs.

He’s saved from having to make a comment by a honk from outside the house, signalling that Doniya is there to pick them up. They’re supposed to arrive earlier than the other guests so that the Malik children can greet everyone and help out if needed, and Niall and Harry have decided to come along. Mostly because they don’t really have another way to get there, but still.

“Ready to face all the questions about when you’re finally getting married, Zayn?” Doniya asks her brother once they’ve all piled into the car. It’s a tight fit with all six of them, but they manage because they’re taking the green van the Maliks apparently used to go on holiday with.

Zayn groans and Niall questioningly looks between the siblings. Doniya catches him in the rear view mirror and grins. “Don’t worry Niall, he gets asked every time, has been since he turned 25. Just as they keep asking me when I’m finally having my first baby, now that I’m married. They can’t believe an almost thirty year old woman doesn’t have a bunch of kids yet.”

“Or that I’m 28 and still haven’t found a girl to marry”, Zayn shrugs, then looks at Niall a bit awkwardly. “Their words.”

“Last month one of our aunts even asked me”, Waliyha pipes up. “And I’m only 23.”

“They’re obsessed with marriages”, Safaa nods. “It’s a bit embarrassing.”

“You’re gonna scare the poor boy off”, Harry laughs from where he’s sat next to Niall, and everyone turns to look at them.

Niall blushes and waves them off. “Don’t worry, it’s not like we’re even thinking about getting married at this point.”

“You’re not?” Safaa asks curiously and Zayn glares at her.

“Shut up”, he says. “No more embarrassing Niall.”

“Oh, he’s getting protective”, Waliyha teases and both girls start laughing, ignoring Zayn’s glare that wanders from his sisters to Harry when a snort escapes him as well.

“What?” Harry asks innocently. “I enjoy watching you in your protective boyfriend mode.”

Doniya pulls up in front of the building they’re throwing the birthday party at before Zayn can do anything to either of them and they all get out, Zayn pulling Niall aside. “Sorry about the whole marriage thing”, he says quietly. “They are all a bit obsessed with it. Fair warning though, there’ll be talk about Perrie. Everyone thought I’d end up marrying her, hell,  _I_  thought so. So, yeah. Just so you know what to expect.”

Niall places his hand on Zayn’s arm and squeezes reassuringly. Zayn’s probably gonna need more strength for those conversations than he will. “I’ll be fine. Are you?”

“Yeah, don’t worry”, Zayn shrugs with a half-smile. “You coming in?”

The first hour or so after the guests start arriving is a bit of a blur to Niall if he’s being honest. He meets so many people he has trouble remembering their names, even though Liam and Louis always call him “stats man” because he usually takes in facts easily and remembers them for years. The problem is maybe that every new conversation is very similar, there’s introductions and then he has to tell the story about how he and Zayn met, talk about his job and then his family, over and over again. There’s not much to discern the different conversations they have, so Niall gets them all mixed up in his head and with them the names of Zayn’s relatives.

Most of them are really nice, no one says anything directly to him being a man, but he does get the occasional weird look. One of the aunts turn to Zayn after he introduces Niall as his boyfriend and asks: “Oh, but what happened to that lovely girl you brought last time? What was her name again?”

When she’s gone, Zayn chuckles drily. “Believe me, she was one of the ones who despised Perrie. Don’t take her seriously.”

It goes better than expected though, and Niall gets the feeling that Zayn sort of assumed the worst case scenario was going to happen, maybe to avoid being disappointed. He’s sure that Zayn was more nervous about this than he let on.

There’s quite a few small children at the party as well, and Niall’s heart does a somersault when he watches Zayn lift up his cousin Shariq to play with him and tickle him, making the little boy squeal and giggle. There’s a huge smile on Zayn’s face, bigger than Niall’s ever seen, and he gulps down his water to get his heart to stop doing these strange things. He does his best to ignore it.

Generally speaking, the party seems to be a big success. There’s tons of food (delicious food, Niall’s been offered a lot by several well-meaning aunts who took it on themselves to make sure he tried everything), laughter and music that’s already getting Niall into the mood for a little dance. It’s different from other birthday parties he’s been to, but it’s great fun and Zayn’s cousins are incredibly nice and welcoming towards him. They all know Harry anyway and it looks promising to be a great evening.

He tells the story about how Zayn supposedly fell into his lap on the tube a couple of more times, and especially Zayn’s cousins find it hilarious and keep teasing him about it.

“He’s usually so careful not to make a fool of himself”, Jawaad laughs. “Always making sure he looks cool and put together, and then you meet him like that. That’s just hilarious.”

Zayn, Harry and Niall spend most of the evening with the younger generation of Zayn’s family, until Harry has to leave to catch the last train shortly before midnight, when the party is still going strong. When he’s gone, Zayn doesn’t lead Niall back towards his cousins but instead puts his arm around Niall and twists them towards the area of the room that’s turned into the dancefloor. It’s the most direct contact they’ve had since they arrived, there’ve only been a few fleeting touches between them and Niall assumes that too is a sign that Zayn was indeed nervous about this.

“Wanna dance?” he asks, and Niall laughs.

“Can't let all that practicing go to waste, can we?”

Technically, the shuffling and jumping they do to the upbeat songs can't be considered dancing, but it's really funny, especially since most people around them are doing the same. When the music switches to something slower, Niall is already a bit sweaty, but the couples around them are suddenly all embracing in some sort of way, so he nervously shuffles a bit closer to Zayn too.

Zayn smiles at him – they’re exactly the same height now, Niall notices, but he knows it’s because of Zayn’s shoes, when they’re both barefoot Niall’s got an inch or two on him – and lifts his arms to wrap them loosely around Niall’s shoulders. Niall smiles back and places his own hands at Zayn’s slim hips, and then they’re dancing, sort of, swaying back and forth amongst all the other couples.

“Thank you again”, Zayn says quietly after a while. “For coming with me. Everyone loves you.”

“It’s been a pleasure”, Niall assures him. “I really like your family and this is probably the best birthday party I’ve ever been to.”

Zayn laughs. “You should tell my dad that.”

They’re quiet again for a few minutes, but Zayn shuffles closer to Niall and places his head on Niall’s shoulder. Niall wills himself to stay calm and just wraps his arms all the way around Zayn, holding him close. Just for show, that’s what this is.

They don’t talk much while they dance but Niall can see Zayn’s family looking over at them regularly, and their smiles still make him feel awkward. They won’t look this way once he and Zayn “break up”, and he’s sad he’ll never get to be around them again. Probably the only downsides to pretend dating Zayn are that he won’t be able to stay in touch with the rest of the Maliks, and that he doesn’t get to actually date Zayn. Niall realises he only has until about noon tomorrow to be Zayn’s boyfriend, and his heart clenches painfully. This stupid crush has got to go, but he vows to make the most of it while he still gets to pretend.

“Niall?” Zayn says quietly and Niall hums in response, waiting for Zayn to continue. “Uh…how would you feel about heightening our PDA a bit?”

“What?” Niall asks, trying not to sound breathless at the implication.

“Just…”, Zayn lifts his head off Niall’s shoulder to look at him. “Everyone’s watching us and I was thinking we should probably give them some sort of show. Nothing major, like, but just maybe sneak a few kisses or…a grope or something?”

“You want me to kiss you?” Niall asks, and now he definitely sounds a little breathless.

“Not, like, a proper snog or anything. Just, are you okay with that?”

“Sure, go ahead.” It’s hard not to sound too eager, but Niall thinks he just about manages. “Nothing wrong with a kiss between mates.”

“Right.” Zayn says, and then suddenly he dips forward and that’s his lips on Niall’s throat, nipping and kissing at the sensitive skin.

Niall lets out a low groan, can’t keep it in, and one of his hands slips lower down Zayn’s back, skims his tiny arse, while the other finds its way up to the back of Zayn’s head, gripping the hair there. Zayn’s mouth wanders upwards, to his jaw, along there all the way to his ear, and Niall’s sure his whole face is flushed by now. Zayn presses a kiss to his cheek, and one to the corner of his mouth, so close to a proper kiss that Niall feels faint for a moment.

“Good show”, he gets out, and Zayn chuckles, bumps their noses together for a moment before pulling him close enough so there cheeks are pressed against each other’s. Niall’s skin is burning hot, and he hopes Zayn doesn’t notice.

At least there are quite a few eyes on them, and Niall thinks they definitely reached Zayn’s goal of convincing his family.

They stay until the last guests leave too, helping Zayn’s parents clean up and pack everything into the two cars they’ve arrived with. Zayn drives Doniya’s car because she left an hour earlier together with her husband, promising to come over the next morning to pick up her car and say goodbye to Niall and Zayn.

The ride home is quiet because everyone’s absolutely knackered, and Niall and Zayn stumble up the stairs to Zayn’s room half asleep. Niall can sleepily appreciate that Zayn puts on a shirt and doesn’t sleep only in his boxers, but he’s too tired to form any more coherent thoughts or do anything like worry. They don’t even talk about who takes which side, just climb onto the bed, Zayn closer to the wall. It’s a tight fit, but neither of them falls out, and Niall turns to face away from the wall.

“Goodnight”, he mumbles, and listens to Zayn rustling around until he’s comfortable.

“Sleep well, Niall.”

-

Niall wakes up hot and hard.

Disoriented, he blinks a couple of times and tries to catalogue everything. The pillow doesn’t smell like his, the light is different, and there’s an arm slung across his waist, radiating heat. The intricate tattoo on the hand resting on his stomach gives it all away, and Niall almost gasps when he remembers where he is.

Zayn is pressed up all along his back, their legs tangled under the sheets, breath puffing against the back of his neck. His shirt must’ve ridden up at some point of the night, because Zayn’s hand is resting directly on Niall’s bare skin, at the base of his ribs. It feels incredible, and Niall’s dick seems to feel the same way, because he’s almost painfully hard.

“Shit”, he hisses quietly, and tries to wriggle out from under Zayn’s arm without waking him up. Slightly panicked, he gets up and opens the door to Zayn’s room, looking around for anyone. When he spots no one, he hurries over to the bathroom quietly.

Inside, he leans against the door, breathing heavily. “Fuck”, he mumbles and looks down at the pretty obvious bulge in his boxers. He tries pressing the heel of his hand to the base of his dick, but it doesn’t help in the least. He doesn’t want to wank in Zayn’s house, with all of his family nearby, especially not when Zayn’s the reason for the whole situation in the first place, but it looks like he doesn’t have another choice. Especially if he doesn’t want to pop a boner every time Zayn so much as looks at him for the rest of the day.

Trisha has laid out a towel for him, and Niall guiltily thinks about what she’d think if she knew what he’s about to do, but his arousal doesn’t go away. Carefully, he takes off his clothes and steps under the shower.

He gets a hand on himself almost immediately, biting his lip to keep in the relieved moan. It won’t take long, he can tell already, and it’ll be even easier with all the imagery he’s gotten over the past 12 hours.

Niall’s hand speeds up, he thumbs across the tip of his cock, pressing into the slit, and thinks of Zayn’s lips on his throat.

Thinks of Zayn’s hand on his stomach, imagines it sliding lower, and his movements speed up. His head drops back against the shower wall and Niall spreads the precome bubbling from the tip of his cock. He’s panting, and his chest, tummy and dick are all flushed red. He watches it slip in and out of his fist and imagines it’s another hand wanking him, darker, tattooed.

With a choked off groan, Niall comes harder than he has in a while, steadying himself with a hand against the wall.

He stands there for a while, water beating down on him, trying to get rid of the shame he feels. This won’t exactly help trying to get rid of the dumb crush he has on Zayn, and he doesn’t know how to look him or anyone from his family in the eyes after this.

He borrows someone’s shower gel and uses it thoroughly, paranoid they’ll be able to smell it on him. When he gets out of the shower he’s squeaky clean but realises he’s forgotten everything in Zayn’s room, including his clothes. Niall stands in front of the mirror for a while, waiting until he thinks the flush has gone down enough to be acceptable for after a shower. He hopes Zayn is still asleep, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.

With the towel slung around his hips he makes his way back to Zayn’s room, once again avoiding running into anyone else. He’s not that lucky with Zayn, who seems to have just woken up. He blinks up at Niall with bleary eyes and a sleepy smile that makes Niall’s heart fucking miss a beat.  _This is getting ridiculous_ , he thinks.

“Morning”, Zayn mumbles, and his voice is low and raspy. Niall’s suddenly happy he’s already had his wank.

“Morning, sleepyhead”, he tries to tease. “Already took a shower.”

Zayn groans tiredly and shoves his head back into the pillow. Niall hopes he stays like this long again for him to dress. He wrestles on his boxers and drops the towel, reaching for his jeans. He’s one leg in when Zayn turns his face back towards him and immediately blushes red. Niall’s pretty sure he looks the same, if not worse. “Sorry, sorry”, Zayn mumbles and Niall’s never gotten dressed this quickly.

“Think ‘m gonna take a shower too”, Zayn announces when Niall is done, and Niall hums, turns his back politely and pretends to pack his bag while Zayn gets up and slips out of the room. He does his hair and usual morning routine while Zayn is gone and tries to get his chill back before he heads down to where he can hear voices.

The rest of the Malik family, including a few relatives that slept over, is already up, apparently just done with setting the table for breakfast. It looks nice and familiar and cosy, and Niall loves it.

“Good morning, sweetheart”, Trisha greets him when he steps into the kitchen. “Did you sleep well?”

“I did, thank you”, Niall smiles at her. “Zayn’s still taking a shower.”

“Oh, don’t worry”, Trisha laughs. “We never wait for him for breakfast, we gave that up when he was about twelve.”

Niall laughs. “He  _does_  like sleeping in a bit too much.”

It doesn’t take much longer for Zayn to come down though, they’ve all just sat down when he enters the room, and Niall can’t stop staring for a few long moments. His hair is still wet, dripping lightly on the white t-shirt he’s wearing, and he still looks a little sleepy. He’s freshly shaven and a bit flushed, and he’s breathtakingly beautiful.

“Morning”, Zayn says and gets a chorus of “good morning”s back, before he slips into the seat next to Niall. He smiles at him and presses a kiss to his cheek that seems almost absent-minded but makes Niall’s heart race. It’s like a switch has been flipped, and suddenly Niall is almost painfully aware of every little thing Zayn does, every little brush of his body against Niall’s, every little smile directed his way.

It’s embarrassing, and distracting, and confusing.

They stay until noon, when Trisha packs them a lunch and Doniya drives them to the station again when she comes to pick up her car. Niall hugs everyone tightly and hopes it passes off as him just being friendly and thankful, but he’s actually very sad he’ll never get to see them again. He even hugs Yaser, who pats him on the back lightly and thanks him for coming. Niall feels as if it’s the biggest sign of acceptance he could get.

It’s just the two of them on the train ride back to London but they sit opposite each other, which makes it possible for Niall to focus enough to actually have a coherent conversation with Zayn. He manages to push his confused and messy feelings to the back of his mind for the time being, deciding to deal with them later.

As always, time passes quickly when he’s with Zayn, and they’re in London before he knows it. When they part, Zayn hugs him tightly for a long moment. “Thank you”, he says quietly. “I hope you had as much fun as I did.”

“I had a great time, Zayn”, Niall mumbles, face pressed to Zayn’s shoulder. He doesn’t want to let go.

“Get a room”, someone nearby jokes, and both of them let go immediately, taking a step apart. Niall blushes and Zayn laughs awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I’ll text you?” he says, and it comes out like a question.

Niall nods and smiles at him. “You better.” He turns around and leaves before he can do something stupid like lean forward and kiss Zayn or something equally as dumb.

He unlocks the door to his and Liam’s flat, drops his bag and jacket, toes off his shoes and trudges into the living room where he finds Liam sitting and doing some reading that looks important. Niall doesn’t let that deter him though, he keeps walking until he’s stood next to the sofa and drops down on it, groaning.

“You okay, Nialler?” Liam asks. “How was your weekend?”

Niall groans some more and punches a pillow for good measure. “I think I’m in love with Zayn.”

“And that's new how?” Liam sounds utterly unimpressed and Niall lifts his head with a frown.

“What are you on about?”

“Did you seriously not notice? Niall, a blind person would've been able to tell.”

“But how?” Niall asks. “I didn't even know it was more than a stupid crush until like a few hours ago.”

“That's because you're kind of oblivious, Nialler. And probably in denial. Which makes sense considering you're currently pretending to be his boyfriend so he doesn't have to admit he isn't over his ex-girlfriend.”

“Wow, thanks Liam”, Niall deadpans. “Remind me of my misery.”

“Sorry”, Liam says with a shrug. “I just think there's no point sugar coating it.”

“I know”, Niall sighs, but it comes out more like a whine. “I got myself into a real mess.”

“You really did”, Liam agrees. “So how do you plan on getting yourself out of it? Like, do you think there's any chance you'll get him to date you for real?”

“No way”, Niall says, and the conviction he says it with makes him feel sad. “I'm pretty sure he's still hung up on Perrie and I won't ever tell him anyway because I don't want him to think I only played along so I could get close to him.”

“Which is the truth, though.”

“I…I wouldn't say that was the only reason. Sure, I didn't wanna give him up after the first time, but I originally just agreed because he looked so desperate.”

“Yeah, well, we all know you're a nice person”, Liam smiles. “But just for the record, I don't think you should give up this easily.”

Niall wants to ask what he's talking about but the front door opens and Louis yells “Honey, I'm home!” He walks into the living room and grins when he spots Niall. “Ah, my favourite Irishman is back. How was your weekend with the in-laws?”

Niall only groans, but Liam answers for him. “Niall's finally figured out he's in love with Zayn.”

“Ohh”, Louis makes knowingly. “Took you long enough.”

“I get it, I'm slow”, Niall whines. “Doesn't change the fact I'm in trouble.”

“Yeah, and I'd love to help you out, but Liam and I have reservations.”

Liam looks up at his boyfriend with wide eyes. “You actually made reservations?”

“’Course, it's our anniversary”, Louis says and leans down to kiss him chastely. “So put those books away and get ready.”

Niall buries his head in the sofa cushion he punched earlier, he doesn't want to witness one of the few sappy moments Liam and Louis have right now. He's in absolutely no mood for that.

“Watch crappy tv and pity yourself until tonight”, Louis advises, patting Niall's back when he and Liam are about to leave, “and then you either get over it or work on getting him. When I see you next I want none of this, alright?”

Niall doesn't reply, just groans into the cushion some more, but Louis seems to take it as agreement, since he pats his back again and murmurs “good boy”. Niall feels like a dog that's being left alone for the night and does as Louis told him: he pities himself.

Liam doesn't come back that night and Niall is sort of relieved, because at least no one's there to catch him watching terrible romantic movies and crying into the ice cream tub he got from the freezer. He feels like a walking cliché, but it's kind of fitting, he thinks. He's fallen for the guy he's pretend dating – couldn’t get much more clichéd, could it?

He has work again the next day so he drags himself out of bed, and the regular actions at work make him feel mostly human again. His hands still get sweaty every time his phone buzzes, but Zayn doesn't text him all day.

There's radio silence all Tuesday long as well, and Niall's starting to feel a bit anxious about it. He knows Zayn has no obligation to text him, to keep in touch at all, but he definitely thought they'd become friends over the course of the past few weeks. Apparently Zayn doesn't think so though, or at least doesn't already miss Niall the way Niall misses him. But then again, Zayn isn't the one who's in love with his fake boyfriend.

On Wednesday morning, Niall wakes up to a series of texts from Zayn that he apparently sent at 3am.

_hope u got home safe the other day_

_sorry ive been mia since then_

_is it stupid to say I miss u_

_??_

_cuz I do_

_lol sorry think im a bit drunk_

Niall's heart is beating too quickly to be entirely normal and he reads over the texts a couple of times, trying to figure out what to reply. This is just a drunk guy texting his mate, he shouldn't read too much into it, keep it casual.

_hahah mate u ok?_

_miss u a little bit too tho deffinately spent too much time w/ u lately_

Zayn doesn't reply for a while and Niall figures he's still asleep if he stayed up that late, knows Zayn sometimes works odd times at the police station.

He picks up his phone quickly enough to be potentially embarrassing when it rings during his lunch break.

“Hey”, Zayn says, and he sounds embarrassed himself. “Sorry for drunk texting you last night. I don't usually do that. Like, get drunk in the middle of the week. Or, like, text my friends if I do.”

Niall laughs. “It's cool, mate. I wasn't lying, I do miss your face, ya know?”

There's what sounds like a relieved sigh on the other end of the line. “You should come over Friday night”, Zayn suggests. “Bring Liam and Louis, if they want. We could have another lad’s night. At home or the pub, dunno. Whatever, really.”

“Yeah, sounds ace”, Niall nods. He can do this, be mates with Zayn. And fall out of love with him anyway, no problem at all. He's got this.

-

Niall so has not got this. It's been almost a month since he last had to pretend he was Zayn's boyfriend, and his heart still jumps to his throat whenever Zayn so much as touches him. Which is annoying, considering they're a pretty tactile group, the five of them. And they hang out all the time, all of them or in smaller groups or pairs – on weekends and during the week.

Sometimes he talks to Zayn's family on the phone, and he knows that they have to fake a breakup soon if they want to avoid another visit or invitation, but neither him nor Zayn have mentioned anything.

Niall ran into Perrie one time and had to tell her how great he and Zayn were doing, and he felt like crying afterwards. He really is in love with Zayn, and it makes everything so much more complicated.

Liam and Louis thankfully leave him mostly alone about it, and Niall thinks Harry suspects something as well, but he never asks either. Niall hopes Zayn doesn't know like the others do, doesn't even suspect, but he thinks he's safe. Zayn has never given him any indication of knowing, and Niall intends to keep it secret until he's over it.

“You okay?” Zayn murmurs from where he's sat next to Niall watching the movie, entirely too close for Niall to be anything like okay, but he smiles and nods anyway.

“Fine, yeah.” Zayn smiles too and squeezes the back of his neck where his arm is draped across the back of the sofa behind Niall, and Niall hates his life a little bit.

-

“We should go out proper”, Louis suggests about two weeks later. “How long has it been since any of you went dancing? We'll be too old for clubs soon, so we should go together one last time. Party like we used to at uni.”

“I didn't even know anyone but Liam at uni”, Niall protests. “And you once you decided to stop sneaking around with my best friend and made it official.”

“I'm in”, Harry says to Louis, ignoring Niall completely. “It'll be fun. And maybe we can even drag Zayn out, he was a right bore at uni.”

“I came out with you loads of times!” Zayn defends himself. “It's not my fault you were into all that indie crap, you barely ever went to a normal party.”

“He says that as if he didn't go to art shows and poetry slams every weekend”, Harry stage whispers to Louis and Liam while Niall chuckles and pats Zayn's shoulder consolingly.

“I'm up for it”, Liam says eventually, shrugging a little. “Niall, Zayn?”

Niall looks at Zayn to check if he looks completely put off and gets a one shouldered shrug, so he shrugs too. “Alright, why not?”

A reason not to go, as it quickly turns out, would be Niall's lack of clothes suited for going out. To a club. He eventually settles on his skinniest black jeans and a black t-shirt with rolled up sleeves, figures it's neutral enough to pass as a casual outfit. He doesn't know what people wear in clubs these days and feels very old because of it.

Liam and Louis meet him at the front door, both dressed in jeans and t-shirts, which makes Niall feel a lot better about his outfit. Harry is another thing altogether, wearing a wildly patterned shirt – Niall thinks it's supposed to be flamingos – and trousers that look tight enough to be painful. Next to him, Zayn is unfairly beautiful in his ripped dark jeans and leather jacket, smoking a cigarette near the entrance of the pub they'd set as their pregaming spot.

“There you are!” Harry calls, engulfing Niall in a hug before moving on to Liam and Louis. Zayn smiles and stubs his cigarette out. He smells like smoke, leather and his most expensive after shave when he hugs Niall, and it takes all Niall has in him not to sniff his neck like a dog.

He does bury his face in Zayn's shoulder for maybe a moment too long but before he can so much as exchange an awkward glance with Zayn, Louis is there to hug him hello.

Inside, Niall offers to get the first round while the others pick a booth. He intends to avoid the awkward process of finding a seat with it because he knows himself well enough to know he’s gonna try and sit down next to Zayn if given the chance, he isn't disciplined enough not to.

What he didn't expect was for Zayn to take off his leather jacket, or rather what he'd be wearing underneath. Niall heads back towards their table, carrying five pints – quite the accomplishment, he thinks – and when he lifts his head to look where he's going, his eyes fall on Zayn. He chokes a little and almost stumbles, just about managing to catch himself and set the pints down on the table, because there's Zayn, wearing a tank top. He's…he's breath taking, and Niall has to forcefully drag his eyes away from his arms and the low collar, revealing tattoos over tattoos that he'd only gotten a glimpse of that night in Zayn's childhood bedroom.

Louis is snickering at him and Niall blushes furiously, but Liam and Harry don't seem to have caught on, they seem worried but let it drop as soon as Niall swears he's fine and they've checked that their drinks are as well.

Niall slides into the booth next to Zayn – obviously that'd be the only open spot, what else – and Louis keeps smirking knowingly, but thankfully keeps his mouth shut. He's a bit scared how long this silence is gonna last, Louis isn't exactly known for being tactful, but for now he's gonna take what he can get. The safest thing is obviously to get them all spectacularly drunk and blame everything on the alcohol, and Louis is on board as soon as Niall sets the plan in motion.

“Yes, Nialler!” he shouts. “This is how we do it, just forget we're supposed to be responsible adults for one night, let's get fucking smashed!”

Liam coughs. “May I remind you of who's the responsible adult in this relationship? Cause it's not you, babe.”

Louis waves him off and Harry laughs. “We don't care about those things tonight”, he says. “Tonight's all about party.”

“Correct, Harold”, Louis grins. “So drink up!”

Niall briefly wonders if this was his best idea, but he's already well into his second pint and so far all it brought him is Zayn's shoulder pressed against his where they're somehow sitting closer than before, so he doesn't dwell for too long.

They order tequila shots about half an hour later to stay within the uni students roles they're all playing tonight, and Niall starts feeling dizzy after downing the second one. Four pints to start with may have been a little much now that he thinks about it, but Louis places a third shot in front of him, so he drinks.

Zayn gets more touchy when he's drunk, it seems, and Niall doesn't say anything when Zayn's hands land on his arms, shoulders, thigh, whenever they talk. It's nice, that's all. No one has to know about the fluttery feeling he gets in his stomach over it, and how he tries to make Zayn laugh just so his hand squeezes Niall’s thigh again.

Everything is funny and a bit wonky when they exit the pub, hailing a cab for the drive to the club. Harry with his gangly limbs gets the passenger seat while the other four try to fit in the back. Louis ends up half in Liam's lap while Niall throws his legs across Zayn’s, and nobody complains, not even the driver – probably because Harry’s being his usual charming self next to him. They probably pay him too much when they get to the club since no one’s sure what they gave anymore, but Niall thinks it's fair after what he had to go through with five drunk guys in their mid- to late twenties.

The club is pretty crowded already when they get in, and Niall suddenly remembers why he always got drunk for parties back at uni because his claustrophobia immediately hits him in this muted kind of way, the way it only does when he's under the influence of alcohol or any sort of drugs he's tried in his time – not many, but they all had the same effect. Still, his breath quickens and his palms get sweaty, but Zayn seems to notice even in his inebriated state, placing a comforting hand on Niall's back. Harry’s at the bar first, organising them drinks, something sweet and fruity and likely very alcoholic.

With the pumping music and the alcohol in their systems there's no way for them to hold any sort of conversation, and Louis quickly drags Liam off to the dance floor. Harry, Zayn and Niall follow them soon, goofing off to the music in a little circle before Harry gets distracted by a girl that keeps dancing too close to him to be a coincidence.

Harry’s been grinning and winking at her for ten minutes, showing off his full dimples, when Niall nudges him her way lightly. “Go get it, tiger”, he jokes and Harry laughs, smacks a kiss to both Niall's and Zayn's cheeks and dances towards the girl.

Niall looks at Zayn who grins and makes a gesture that Niall interprets as “just us now”, and they keep up the style of dancing they've already practiced at Yaser’s birthday party. The alcohol has definitely lowered their inhibitions though, because while it was just funny at the party, Zayn is suddenly swaying his hips in a way that makes Niall's mouth go dry. He’s not even sure if Zayn notices, but the little thrusts and rolls make it increasingly difficult for Niall not to reach out and touch, especially since he's given up trying not to stare.

One guy seems to agree with him, as he's suddenly behind Zayn, grinding on him. Niall glares at the hands on Zayn's hips, wondering if it'd be too obvious to push the guy off Zayn. When his gaze snaps up to Zayn's face though, he's looking at him with wide eyes, confused, as if he hadn't expected anyone else to approach him while he's with Niall. It gives Niall the courage to fix the guy in a stare and get close enough to imply that he's with Zayn and wants him to get his hands off Zayn, which the guy does. He puts his hands up in surrender and backs off, and suddenly Niall's in his position, heart hammering.

He's danced like this before, grinding, bodies pressed close with possessive hands, but it's usually been with mates for a laugh or when he was trying to get laid. This is...something else.

Zayn lifts one arm and places his hand on the side of Niall's neck, keeping up the movement of his hips. Niall suppresses a shudder, hides his face against Zayn's shoulder for a second. When he looks up, the crowd has parted just enough to spot Perrie, of all people, standing near the bar with some guy. He nudges Zayn lightly, watches his eyes fly open and lock on the pair.

“You okay?” Niall murmurs, and Zayn nods. “Good thing we're keeping up the façade like this.”

Zayn chuckles at that and suddenly twists in Niall's arms so he's facing him. He places his hand on Niall's jaw, fingers splaying down to his neck, and his eyes are hooded where he's definitely staring at Niall's lips. Niall's heart thuds harshly, once, twice.

His hands are still on Zayn's hips but they're not dancing anymore, just standing there, and he nervously licks his lips, watching as Zayn mirrors the action. Niall's eyes flicker back to Perrie once more and she's not even watching, but she could turn any second and besides – he really, really wants to kiss Zayn. Distantly, he notices how very drunk they both are, but Zayn's so  _close_ , and then he sighs, Niall feels the rush of air more than he hears it in the noise of the club, and then he leans in.

Zayn's lips are soft, as expected, and a little chapped, but Niall whines right into it, can't even be embarrassed about how his arms slide around Zayn's hips, pulling him in, one of them wandering up between his shoulder blades to get him closer. Zayn's back arches sinfully and one of his hands is in Niall's hair, pulling lightly. Niall stops thinking, just licks into Zayn's mouth greedily, tries to taste all of him. Zayn hums a little and tries gaining control, sucks on Niall's tongue and then bites at his lip a little – and he's wicked at this. If Niall had allowed himself to think about it more, this is what he would've imagined kissing Zayn would be like.

Zayn starts mouthing along his jaw, nipping at the skin there, kissing his way down Niall's throat to his collar, and Niall shoves one of his hands in Zayn's back pocket, slots his thigh between Zayn's and pulls him closer. Zayn groans, his mouth on Niall's skin goes slack while he tightens his grip on the back of Niall's shirt. He lifts his head and meets Niall's lips again hungrily, pushing his whole body against Niall's, holding him tightly. They're grinding properly now, dirty rolls of their hips and wandering hands, and Niall feels like he's in heaven. He can tell he's not the only one, can feel Zayn hardening against his thigh, and his own pants grow tight.

Niall presses a series of kisses to Zayn's stubbly jaw, makes his way back, and flicks his tongue out against the skin just below his ear. Zayn moans, hips bucking up against Niall's, and he holds onto his shoulders as if it's hard to keep himself upright. Niall bites his earlobe carefully, pulls a little, and feels Zayn's fingers dig into his shoulders, his chest vibrate with his groan. “Wanna get out of here?”

Zayn nods jerkily, kisses him sloppily. “Come back to mine.”

Niall nods and takes his hand, pulls him towards the exit. They pass Perrie and this time she sees them, smirks knowingly and waves, but she doesn't stop them. They're out of the club quickly and Niall half expects Zayn to push him away as soon as they're out of Perrie’s sight, but Zayn drags him straight to a taxi and tells the driver his address, and then Niall is too occupied kissing Zayn to worry about anyone's motives or possible regrets.

They tip the driver generously when they arrive at Zayn's, and Niall blushes when he realises he probably saw a lot more than he wanted to, but Zayn's still holding his hand and pulling him inside, so he stops thinking again. They snog in the elevator, the mirrors on the wall cool against Niall's back, and then they're in Zayn's flat.

They don't even turn on the lights, both of them familiar with the layout, stumbling through the living room drunk off the alcohol and each other, kissing messily and losing more and more items of clothing. They're already naked when Zayn pushes him back onto his bed, caging him in and leaning down to kiss him. Niall reaches up to place his hand at the back of his neck, his other hand settling on Zayn’s waist, thumb stroking circles into his skin idly.

Zayn lifts a hand to stroke Niall's jaw, and drags his fingers down his throat and across his chest, straight to his nipples, flicking one of it lightly. Niall moans and feels his back arch off the bed. He flips them over so he's on top, straddles Zayn and tries to keep it together when their erections brush and Zayn whines, bucking up. He spends almost ten minutes cataloguing Zayn's tattoos, stroking and kissing each one while Zayn grows impatient under him, groans and mumbles and tries to get him to move. “Let me know when you're done up there”, he grumbles, presses his fingers into the dips of Niall's hips and Niall laughs, leans down to kiss him and then slides lower until he can take Zayn's cock into his mouth.

A choked off moan is all the reaction he gets when he swallows him down without warning, and Zayn's hips buck up helplessly. His hands are scrabbling for purchase, one of them finding Niall's head and gripping a handful of hair, and he makes incoherent noises that Niall interprets as a positive reaction.

He looks up to find Zayn already staring at him, propped up on one elbow, mouth hanging open around a moan. He's hot, and so responsive, and Niall tries to take him deeper, flexes his butt and rolls his hips against the mattress in search for some friction.

Zayn's still watching him, pulling on his hair occasionally, or stroking down Niall's face with a single finger, and Niall alternates between taking as much of Zayn as he can and kitten licking the tip, working the rest over with his hand. He’s always enjoyed giving head, and with someone who’s as enthusiastic about it as Zayn, it’s pure bliss.

“Niall”, Zayn says, and his voice sounds fucked out and rough, as if  _he_  was the one sucking a dick, but his fingers are on Niall's chin now so Niall follows his lead and pulls off with a wet sound.

“Hm?” he makes inquiringly, pressing a soft kiss to Zayn's thigh.

“Come up here”, Zayn orders and Niall follows, letting Zayn kiss him slow and dirty. They're pressed close together, Niall pretty much lying on top of Zayn but he lifts himself up a little when Zayn tries to wriggle a hand in between them, pausing on Niall's chest to rub one of his nipples. Niall groans, has always been sensitive there, and Zayn smirks, moves until he can fit his lips around the pink bud, nipping and sucking until Niall's arms are shaking and he's mumbling things that might be pleas for more. Zayn's hand is on his cock then, moving slowly and working Niall up until he feels it all the way to his bones, thrusting into Zayn's hand desperately.

Zayn comes back up to kiss him slowly, hand stilling and Niall whines a little, bites Zayn's lip a bit harshly and Zayn chuckles, wraps his hand around both of their cocks now. Niall moans into his mouth, the slide is delicious this way - Zayn's cock still wet from Niall's mouth and Niall is already wet enough from the precome he's spurting so it serves as a kind of lube.

They're grinding again, cocks sliding together, and they're still kissing, even though it's mostly deteriorated to panting into each other’s mouths. Niall reaches down too, wraps his fingers around Zayn's, and the friction is even better, the tight heat of their hands perfect as they speed up their movements.

“Come on”, Zayn whimpers. “Come on, babe.”

Niall makes a desperate sound that's potentially embarrassing and buries his head against Zayn's neck, bites and sucks at the skin there to muffle the sounds he's making and Zayn reaches up with his free hand, grabs Niall's butt and pulls him down. His hand tightens around them and then Niall's coming between them, come splattering across both his and Zayn's torsos. Zayn groans at the sight, speeds up even more and Niall winces a little when he squeezes his over sensitive cock but lets go to swipe his thumb across the head of Zayn's cock.

“That's it, come for me”, he mumbles, lips against the shell of Zayn's ear. Zayn stills when he comes and Niall strokes him through it, kissing his shoulder.

Zayn looks up at him with stars in his eyes when Niall pulls back, and he kisses him, laughs a little tiredly and slumps on the bed next to him.

“Clean up tomorrow”, Zayn slurs. “Tired.”

Niall doesn't say anything, feels the alcohol and post-sex adrenaline course through his veins but he's too tired to move a single muscle, so he closes his eyes and drifts off within a second.

-

When Niall wakes up the sun must've just risen, it shines weakly, almost white, through Zayn's blinds.

_Zayn._

With a start, Niall sits up in bed and sure enough, Zayn's asleep next to him, and as far as he can tell with the thin sheet thrown over them, neither of them is wearing a single thing.

“Fuck”, Niall mutters and tries to think around the pounding in his head. They had sex last night, that much he can remember, but it's a bit hard to say who initiated it or how drunk they were. Pretty fucking drunk, he concludes. Perrie was there, he remembers next, and it sends his mind reeling. What if Zayn only kissed him to let Perrie see he was over her? He probably did, he didn't make a move until Niall pointed her out to him, and then they just continued. Niall thinks that Zayn was probably too drunk to think clearly, and kissing someone doesn't necessarily mean anything. So Zayn kissed him to prove a point and then continued because they were both horny and too drunk to see what a bad idea it was.

Niall's heart beats painfully as he looks over at Zayn's sleeping form, eyelashes fanning across his cheeks. They had sex, but he's still unattainable. Niall dreads the moment Zayn wakes up and realises what happened, what mistake they've made, and decides he really doesn't want to be there for that.

With a pounding in his head and an ache in his chest that has nothing to do with the alcohol he consumed last night, Niall carefully gets up, puts on the clothes he finds strewn all across Zayn's flat and writes a short note that he places on the bedside table. Zayn's still peacefully sleeping and Niall looks at him with a heavy heart, wonders what will happen to them now. He leaves with a quiet click of the lock.

At home, he showers, washes the sticky come off his stomach and gets rid of every trace of Zayn. He finds a love bite on his right pec, purple against his pale skin and takes a shaky breath, wills back the tears. He's not gonna cry over this, he got one night with Zayn and that's it.

Maybe this'll at least mean he got it out of his system and can finally get over the whole thing, which would be the best anyway. He doesn't feel like it at the moment, but this is exactly what he told Zayn that night Perrie came over, right? It'll hurt for a while, you don't just get over loving someone that easily, but it'll eventually get better. He'll just wait for that, no problem.

For now though, Niall thinks it's alright to hide in his room under his duvet, muffling his crying in his pillow until he finally falls asleep.

-

When he wakes up the next time, the pounding in his head hasn't gotten any better, but it's different now and Niall knows it's not the hangover but his crying that caused it. He takes another shower and mentally prepares himself to face Liam and most likely Louis as well. Desperately, he hopes they haven't seen him and Zayn kiss last night, he'd much rather keep this whole episode a secret. He doesn't want to lie to them either though, so he doesn't know what to say in case they ask him what he and Zayn got up to after they left. Especially since he's sure they'd make him talk to Zayn, something he wants to avoid at all costs.

_I know this shouldn't have happened, but I guess we were drunk. Let's forget anything ever happened yeah? We can just go back to being mates._

He's said everything he wants to say in the note he left, knows that everything else would give too much away. If Zayn ever wants to talk about it, he might have to run away or jump off a bridge or something, anything but talk. It'd end up embarrassing, he'd probably cry or do something even more mortifying, like beg at Zayn's feet for him to love him, so he'd like to avoid any sort of confrontation. Including one with Liam and Louis.

He can't hide forever though, and when he eventually leaves his bedroom for the kitchen, he finds his friends sitting at the table there, both with cups of tea in front of them, looking decidedly less for wear.

“Morning”, Liam mumbles, and Louis just groans into his mug.

“Long night, lads?” Niall asks, getting himself a mug and putting on the kettle.

“I'm never drinking again”, Liam announces, and Louis shushes him.

“I don't remember a thing from the club”, he mumbles, leaning his head against Liam's shoulder. “That damned taxi is my last memory.”

“We danced”, Liam supplies helpfully, looking thoughtful. “And we drank some more. Did Harry get us cocktails? Dunno, but I remember I pretty much had to carry you to the taxi and then to your bed. Saw Harry with some bird, I think. I didn't see you or Zayn though, did you have a good night?” He directs the last bit at Niall who studies his mug concentratedly and shrugs.

“Definitely had too much to drink too. ‘S all a bit blurry.”

“I'm never drinking again”, Liam repeats, and Louis nods against his shoulder, eyes closed. They look cosy and couple-y, and Niall's heart aches. He wants that too, wants it with Zayn.

A little hiccup escapes him, almost a sob, and both Liam and Louis look at him in alarm. “Sorry”, he mumbles. “Head hurts.”

Liam wordlessly pushes the pack of aspirin across the table to him and Louis pats his hand consolingly. They're pretty great friends, and at least Niall doesn't have to explain anything to them. It's probably the first good thing to happen today.


	3. the finding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> at the beginning of this fic i said i’d be posting a chapter a week but then i ended up finishing it faster than i thought i would, so we’ve already arrived at the last chapter :) :( i spent a long time working on this fic and it’s gotten a bigger response than i could’ve hoped for, thank you so much for all the kudos and comments and nice asks or tags on tumblr, i really appreciate them all!! i hope you like this last chapter :) come say hi on tumblr!

Niall doesn't text Zayn, hopes to avoid him for as long as possible, but for some idiotic reason he's still a bit disappointed that Zayn doesn't try to contact him either. It feels like a rejection, and even though he knew it'd happen, it really fucking hurts.

The purple love bite on his chest starts to fade and Niall watches it, can’t help but press his fingers against it hard sometimes, just to feel it. He takes to touching it when he’s wanking, feels terrible about it but can’t think about anything but Zayn.

Objectively, Niall knows he won't be able to avoid Zayn forever, they're in a friend group now, one they started themselves, and it's only a matter of time until one of their friends suggests meeting up, but Niall would prefer to let as much time pass as possible so he doesn't start to cry the moment he lays eyes on Zayn. At this point, his heart still feels like a raw wound that he'd like to let heal for a bit.

“You up for a pint with the lads tonight?” Liam asks him on Wednesday over breakfast, and that's most definitely too soon.

“Can't”, he says, and tries not to sound too relieved when he remembers that is actually the truth. “Got a skype conference thingy with my boss and this up and coming band from Australia.”

“Aw”, Liam makes. “Next time, then? It's different when it's not all of us.”

“Yeah, sure”, Niall says, but if he can he'll avoid seeing Zayn for a much longer time. He wishes he could regret introducing Zayn to his friends, but they've all been getting along too well for him to want to take it back. It feels like the five of them just clicked, and he's not gonna ruin that because he temporarily can't face Zayn.

No one's home yet when he gets back from work, which was sort of Niall's intention when he didn't tell Liam the conference call would be over at 10pm at the very latest. He takes the opportunity to have a good cry and feels pathetic for it, likes he's a lovesick teenager and not a 27-year-old man, but it feels good to let it all out.

Niall's allowed to come in later the next day, so he has time for a proper chat with Liam, who's back at uni to get his master’s degree and therefore has a lot more time he's able to spend at home.

“It was good”, Liam shrugs when Niall asks him how last night was. “Nothing special though. Except…do you know what's up with Zayn? He seemed a bit…off all night.”

“Uh, no”, Niall says, trying to sound casual. “He hasn't said anything to me.” Which is true in every way, him and Zayn haven't communicated at all since _that_ night. His heart has started hammering though, the mention of Zayn’s name is apparently enough now.

Liam hums. “I mean, I don't know him that well yet and he said he's fine, but maybe if you ask…”

“I don't really know him much better than you do”, Niall says and it comes out strangely defensive, which Liam obviously notices, frowning a little.

“We both know that's not true, Niall. But alright, I'm just saying. And if there's anything you wanna talk about, I'm here, yeah?”

He's gone before Niall can even start to wrap his head around that, but then he just sits and stares into his cereal for a while. Does Liam know more than he let on the other day? Or is he just suspecting? That'd be bad enough, Niall thinks, but probably manageable. The fact that Zayn is acting weird around their friends makes him worry again though. How badly has this whole thing fucked up not only him and apparently Zayn, but their whole friend group? Is Zayn ever gonna be able to be in the same room as him again, does he hate him now? Zayn hating him is probably the last thing Niall wants, because even though it might be hard to look at him for a while, he still thinks it'd be much better to be just friends with Zayn than to not have him in his life at all.

Niall rubs at his eyes furiously, trying to keep back the tears. He's already spent too much time crying, it's time to get over it and move on so his chest stops aching and he can hang out with his friends again. For now, he plans on burying himself in work and avoiding any talk about Zayn until his hands stop shaking at the mention of him.

-

It turns out that Niall has picked a good week for voluntarily working more hours, his boss calls him a gift from the gods and hands him a huge box with files and CDs, then goes home for what he says is the first time in 72 hours. The workload stays high for over a week even though Niall goes in on Saturday too, and when they finally catch up on everything on Thursday, his boss tells him he'll get a pay rise before long.

“This'll all pay off soon, all the hard work”, he says, pats Niall's shoulder. “And you'll be the first to see it on your bank account.”

Niall loves his work, loves _Wall of Sound_ and loves discovering new music, giving them a chance to showcase their talent, he'd do it for even less, but – if he gets paid more it'll mean he can afford more, maybe fly home more often, see his family, so he's in a pretty good mood when he gets home that night.

“Please say you're free tomorrow night”, Liam says from where he's apparently been waiting for him at the kitchen table and nearly scares Niall to death.

“Jesus”, he exclaims, pressing a hand to his chest. “Warn a guy, would ya?”

“Sorry”, Liam says offhandedly, leaning forward to narrow his eyes at Niall. “So, can you come out with us tomorrow?”

“Uh”, Niall makes. “Got work again, dunno for how long…” He sounds uncertain and he knows it, doesn't have an excuse but doesn't know how to ask about Zayn. If he's gonna be there too, if he'll be okay with Niall coming. If Niall is ready to face him yet.

“Come on”, Liam whines. “Harry’s been asking about you for almost two weeks, he won't stop texting me that he misses you.”

Niall doesn't say anything, but he's got probably twenty texts from Harry with the same content on his phone, ones he's replied to occasionally.

“Please, Niall”, Liam begs. “It'll only be Tommo, Harry and me otherwise, Zayn's already said he's busy. Don't leave us hanging.”

Niall hesitates. If Zayn's not coming…it's true, he hasn't seen Harry since _that_ night either, and he does miss him. “Alright”, he says. “I'll see if I can get off work in time.”

-

Niall puts the last box at work away at five pm sharp. “Great work”, his boss says and claps him on the shoulder. “We'll start recording with the new artists next week so it'll stay busy for a while, but we got the worst out of the way. Wouldn't’ve been able to do it without you, kid. You'll be running this studio before long, watch out.”

Niall laughs. “I wouldn't dare push you aside, Martin, don't get your knickers in a twist just yet.”

“Not yet, maybe”, his boss says, and he's suddenly fixing Niall with a serious look. “But I've got maybe ten years left, at most, and you're the one who's fit best for it. You've got a good hand with the artists you pick, an ear for their sound, you got the writing down, even, and the technical part in the studio. You're good with accounting and all the other office stuff, and people like you. Reckon you'd be better at this than me.”

Niall stares at him. “You're crazy.”

“No, I’m not”, Martin insists. “I want to make you second in command. Think about it, yeah? Could provide for a family and all.”

“Which I don't have.”

“Yet”, his boss winks. “You'll find yourself a nice boy, get married and adopt a bunch of babies sooner than you'd think.”

Niall laughs wryly, pushes Zayn out of his head with effort. “We'll see about that. But thank you, boss, I'm flattered. I'll definitely think about it.”

He gets another pat on the back and leaves for the weekend, feeling jittery. If he's honest, he doesn't really have to think about Martin’s offer. It's what he wanted since he started at Wall of Sound almost two years ago, is practically what he does already anyway, just with more power and a higher pay. He'll call his da anyway, just to hear the opinion of someone who he trusts in matters like this.

It's Willie who calls him though, just as he gets on the tube.

“Nialler”, his cousin says in greeting. “How've you been?”

“Just got offered a promotion”, Niall says, listens to the sound and likes it. “Second in command. Yourself?”

“Not as good as you, apparently”, Willie laughs. “You gonna take it?”

“Think so”, Niall says. “Gonna talk to da about it first.”

Willie hums. “Say hello from me when you do. And apart from that? How's your fake relationship going?” There's a laugh in his voice, him and Brez had taken the piss out of Niall all night after he'd told them but Niall can feel his face fall, his mouth drawing into a hard line.

“Not good.”

Willie makes a sound that sounds surprised and emphatic, and Niall is glad he knows him well enough not to try and make a joke or anything. “What happened?”

Niall sighs deeply, bites at his thumbnail. “We had sex.” The elderly lady opposite looks up at him, only to turn away quickly when she sees him noticing.

“Okay”, Willie says. “I feel like I’m out of the loop, here. So it’s not actually a fake relationship anymore?”

“It’s not a relationship at all”, Niall says, and he can tell how devastated he sounds. The lady glances at him with pity in her eyes now. Niall looks down. “But it hasn’t been fake from my side for a long time.”

“Shit”, Willie breathes. “Sorry, bro. And he doesn’t feel the same?”

“No. He’s still hung up on his ex.”

“Fuck. The one you started this whole thing for? Still?” Willie asks and Niall hums in affirmation. “How did he say? After you…you know?”

“He didn’t say anything, didn’t give him the chance”, Niall explains and avoids looking at the lady who’s still obviously listening to his side of the conversation. “I left before he woke up, didn’t wanna be there for when he realised what happened. We’ve become friends, you know? I wish we could at least be that.”

“Ni…”, Willie says, and he sounds a bit helpless. “I’m so sorry, honestly. But…have you considered talking to him? What if he doesn’t feel the way you think he does?”

“We were drunk, Willie”, Niall says tiredly. “We were at a club and his ex was there. He saw her, and kissed me, then we left. I should’ve stopped him, but I was fucking pissed and also…fuck, Willie, I’m so in love with him.”

Willie makes shushing noises over the phone while Niall tries to keep it together, but his voice already broke saying it, and now it’s very hard not to let the dam he’s built break as well. The lady smiles at him sympathetically and Niall tries to smile back this time, wipes across his face with his free hand. “Sorry.”

“No, no, you’re okay”, Willie says, and Niall loves him fiercely. “It’ll all be alright. Do you need me to come over?”

“Can’t”, Niall says regretfully. “I promised Liam I’d come out with him today, he’s been worrying about me.”

“How long has it been?”

“Two weeks”, Niall mumbles.

“It’ll get better”, he says, assuring. “Call me if you need anything, yeah? I can come over anytime.”

“Thanks, Willie. Love you.”

“Love you, too. Be safe.”

Niall puts the phone down the moment the lady opposite him stands up to get off the tube, and she smiles again, stands right in front of him. “I couldn’t help but hear a bit of what you said”, she says, “and I just wanted to wish you good luck. You deserve to be loved the way you love.”

Niall chokes up a bit and doesn’t get the chance to say anything before she’s gone, but he’s suddenly immensely thankful for the good people of the world.

-

“Good, you’re here”, Liam greets him when he gets home, then stops and looks at Niall closely. “Everything alright?”

Niall nods, musters up his best smile. “Martin offered me a promotion.” He tells Liam the whole story of how Martin brought it up and gets a tight hug for it.

“I’m so proud of you, Nialler”, Liam says, smacks a kiss to Niall’s cheek. “Even more reason to go out tonight.”

“Where are we going? What’s the plan?”

“Just to Harry’s”, Liam shrugs. “He said he’s got some good beer at home, so we figured that’d be easiest. We’re leaving at half eight.”

“Ace“, Niall says. “I’ll be ready then.” He leans against the door of his room when he’s inside, closing his eyes. It won’t be easy to seem carefree and happy around his friends tonight, and he promises himself not to drink too much. He gets talkative when he drinks sometimes, and occasionally gives away more than he should.

He spends an hour trying to get himself into a better mood, burying the heartache as deep as he can, and changes out of his work clothes into another pair of ripped jeans and a simple white t-shirt. He considers doing his hair but decides he doesn’t have to for the boys, does _not_ think about there not being anyone to impress, and goes to the kitchen.

Liam is there, so is Louis, who must’ve come sometime after Niall. “Nialler!” he shouts, ruffles his hair before pulling him into a hug. “Don’t see you around much these days.”

“Yeah, sorry, Lou”, Niall mumbles, holds on to him for a little longer. “Work’s busy lately.”

“Heard you’re gonna be the boss soon”, Louis laughs. “Congrats.”

“Not quite the boss, yet”, Niall says, but he grins. Maybe tonight won’t be too bad.

Harry clings to him like a koala for five minutes when they get to his flat (which is only a street away from Zayn’s, but Niall doesn’t think about that). “Don’t ever leave me for this long again”, he mumbles into the side of Niall’s neck.

Niall laughs and pets his head. “Missed you too, Haz.”

Liam tells Harry about Niall’s promotion before they’ve even moved to the living room, so Harry gets out some fancy champagne he got from his friend Grimmy who’s a radio host apparently and they drink that instead of the beer Niall was promised. He feels very loved though when his friends toast to him and cheer.

“Love you guys”, he says and Harry coos, kisses his cheek, while Louis squeezes his arm.

“We only want you to be happy”, Liam says and it’s a bit cryptic, but Niall doesn’t ask because he feels like people’s words have brought him close to tears too many times already today.

The doorbell rings and something strange happens, something like an electric current runs through the other three as all of them sit up straighter, seem jittery suddenly. Niall looks at them confused, frowning. “Did you order food already?” he asks Harry, who ignores him and gets up. Niall turns to Liam and Louis, who seem to be watching him. “What’s going on?”

“Look, Niall, we really care about you”, Liam says, and the look in his eyes is sincere.

“What are you on about?” Niall asks, but then Harry’s opened the door apparently, and there’s a voice that’s definitely not some delivery guy, it’s a voice Niall knows all too well. “What the…Liam, fuck, I’m – you said he wouldn’t be here-“ He only realises he's gotten up when Louis looks at him like his reaction is exactly what he expected, and suddenly feels like everything is too much. “I'm gonna – I should go…”

“Yeah, you just gonna pull that stunt again?”

Niall's head spins around without him having any control over it, and there's Zayn. He’s cut his hair, it’s sort of a buzz cut now but he pulls it off, together with what seems to be a nose piercing. His sight makes Niall feel lightheaded, but the look on his face feels like a punch straight to the gut. He looks angry, which is sort of what Niall expected, wouldn't be surprised if Zayn blamed him for everything, but it's like his heart is being ripped out of his chest all over again.

He can't talk, can't even really breathe, and everyone's just _looking_ at him, he feels so betrayed and helpless and alone –

“I don't know what this is”, Zayn says, and directs his glare at Harry, Louis and Liam, “and what you were intending with it, but since Niall apparently can't even stand to look at me anymore, it's probably better if I go.”

“What are you…” Niall manages to get out. “This has nothing to do with _me_ looking at _you_ , what the fuck?”

“Listen”, that's Liam's voice and it's coming from the door, so Niall turns to find all three of them standing there. “You've obviously got a lot to talk about, so we'll just leave you here until you've cleared stuff up.”

“Was this the plan all along then?” Niall asks, clenching his fists angrily. “I can't believe it.”

“You'll thank us later”, Louis says, and then they're out of the door.

“No, don't you dare lock that d-“ Zayn starts yelling, but he stops when there's a distinct _click_. “Fuck.”

Yeah, Niall thinks. Fucking fuck.

“Happy now?” he asks. “I can't _run away_ now.” He means to make it sound malicious, sarcastic, but it comes out mostly sad.

“I'm not happy, Niall”, Zayn says, and he just sounds tired now. “If you don't want to see me, I'll let you go.”

Niall huffs. “What are you even on about? I don't get a thing of what you're saying today.”

“Because you don't listen!” Zayn sounds angry again and Niall crosses his arms, frowns at him. He's not just gonna accept all of Zayn's accusations like this, they were both involved after all.

“Where should I have listened?” he asks, raising his voice as well. “What do you want, Zayn? You haven't _said_ anything!”

“Because you didn't give me the chance! You just left.”

It's quiet for a few seconds as Niall tries to process the implication. Does Zayn mean…? “Are you saying you wanted me to stay?” he asks quietly, can hear how breathless and pathetically hopeful he sounds.

“Yeah, Niall”, Zayn says and Niall's breath hitches while his heartbeat skyrockets. “Thought I'd made that clear.”

“Like…” Niall hesitates, tries not to get his hopes up. Maybe Zayn isn't saying what he thinks he is. “ _Stay_ stay?”

Zayn laughs, takes a step towards him. “Yes, _stay_ stay. Did my actions really not make that obvious?”

“I…”, Niall starts, heart racing at least as quickly as his thoughts. “But what about Perrie?”

Zayn frowns, confused. “What about her?”

“You're not over her yet!”

Zayn still looks confused. “Yes I am? Have been for weeks, at least. I think it's been much longer, actually, and I just didn't realise until I met you. You've opened my eyes, I guess.”

“What are you saying?” Niall whispers it, doesn't dare to hope.

“Why did you run?”

It's not the answer Niall was hoping for, but he figures it's time to go for broke. “I was scared. I woke up and thought about how drunk we were, how Perrie was there, and I thought you'd only kissed me because you wanted to prove a point.” He hesitates again. “Did you?”

Zayn takes another step closer, close enough so Niall would be able to touch him of he reached out, and shakes his head. “No. It had nothing to do with Perrie or anyone but you and me.”

“Yeah?” Niall breathes and this time it's him who takes a step, so they're practically chest to chest.

Zayn smiles softly and his hand twitches, as if he's about to reach out for Niall. Then his face goes serious again. “When I woke up and you were gone, when I read your note…I thought you'd just used me. Dunno, like a good fuck for the night or something. And then when you woke up you realised you didn't actually want me any other way.”

“No”, Niall whispers, and he wants nothing more than to touch Zayn. There's no way he's gonna be anything but brutally honest now, he doesn't think he'd be able to stop himself anyway. This is his only chance, and it's either gonna work out or not, but he's gonna give it his all. “No, you couldn't have been more wrong. Zayn, I've wanted you in a committed relationship sort of way pretty much since the beginning.”

“Committed relationship?” Zayn repeats and Niall swallows nervously.  

“Yeah”, he says. “Listen, Zayn, I hope I don't ruin everything with this, but I'm in far too deep to settle for anything less. Like, I guess what I’m saying is that I stopped pretending when we were acting like a couple a long time ago. And I don't know if that makes you uncomfortable or-“ 

Zayn kisses him.  

Niall can feel the surprised noise in the back of his throat but he kind of forgets about everything but Zayn's lips on his, wraps his arms around him and pulls him closer, doesn't ever want to let go again. Zayn pulls away eventually though, but his hand stays on Niall's face, cupping his cheek, and when Niall opens his eyes Zayn is looking at him in what seems to be a fond sort of disbelief.  

“What?” Niall asks, smiles.  

“I just didn't really dare to hope this would happen ever again”, he explains, pecks Niall's lips. “You're an idiot.” 

“Why?” Niall asks, trying to sound offended, but his laugh ruins it a bit.  

“Why didn't you just talk to me? You shouldn't’ve assumed I wasn't over Perrie yet.” 

Niall bites his lip sheepishly. “Sorry about that. I guess I was just too nervous you'd think I was taking advantage of you or something.” 

“Why would I think that?” Zayn asks.   

“Dunno, like maybe you'd think I wanted sex with you as sort of a reward for helping you out?” 

“Nah”, Zayn says. “I only assumed you went home with me because I was there, like, you would've taken someone else if I hadn't.”

“No”, Niall says and kisses him quick. “Absolutely very much not. It was literally just because I was too drunk to fight my feelings.”

“Yeah?” Zayn asks. “So you've been, uh, wanting this for a while?”

Niall laughs quietly and leans his forehead against Zayn's shoulder so he doesn't have to look at Zayn. His heart flutters nervously. “That's one way to put it”, he starts carefully. “But I want to stop hiding stuff from you already, so…I've been attracted to you since the beginning, before you even talked to me on the tube. And that weekend at your parents’? That was when I realised I was in love with you.”

He can feel Zayn's hand tighten on his waist, the one that's still resting at the side of his neck twitches, and Niall tenses, expects Zayn to step away and say something like “sorry, but this is going too fast for me. Sorry, I don't feel about you that way. Sorry, but it's making me uncomfortable what I let you do while we obviously weren't on the same page.” Nothing happens though, instead Niall suddenly feels Zayn's lips soft against his temple.

“I think that was when I first fully accepted I was way over Perrie and more attracted to you than I originally wanted to admit. Like, my mum talked to me a bit about it and how I'd never been one for PDA, but we still got kind of cosy on the dance floor and it got me thinking, like, we didn't have to do it, but I thought it was a good idea at the time. So then I started questioning my motives and well, here we are.”

“So you're not, like, freaked out?” Niall lifts his head slowly and blinks at Zayn, who strokes along Niall’s jaw with his thumb and shakes his head.

“About what? You being in love with me? No, I’m not freaked out.”

“You don’t have to feel the same way yet. Just, I dunno, it’d be sick if you thought you’d be able to eventually.”

“I wasn’t gonna tell you this right away”, Zayn said. “I was gonna make you work for it, after you just up and left like I was some random one night stand –“

“I’m so sorry, Zayn-“, Niall interrupts him, but Zayn shushes him gently.

“That was on the off chance you’d even want to be with me, though, and I didn’t allow myself to imagine that properly, so. Turns out I’m not so good at denying you things, especially when it means I’m denying myself things as well with it. You mean it?”

Niall isn’t sure what Zayn’s getting at, but he feels oddly hopeful, so he nods. “Yeah, Zayn. I love you.”

Zayn nods, takes a deep breath. “Okay, cool, because…I love you, too.”

“You idiot!” Niall yells and slaps Zayn’s chest with the back of his hand. “I was expecting you to maybe say you’d give me a chance, was ready to be understanding about it and everything, but I wasn’t prepare for this at all! You can’t just tell a man you love him just like that, my heart might _explode_ -“

For the second time, Zayn interrupts Niall by kissing him. He grabs his face in both hands and smashes their lips together, making Niall gasp, but he can still feel Zayn’s smile against his. “I love you”, he whispers, “I love you, I love you.” Niall’s heart absolutely, positively feels like it’s about to explode, but he holds onto Zayn as tightly as possible and keeps pressing kisses to his lips, over and over again.

There’s a banging from the door and Zayn and Niall break apart just enough to look over at where the noise is coming from. Harry’s standing there, wide-eyed, but grinning. “We heard yelling and I came to check if you were both still alive”, he explains, then turns to yell over his shoulder: “They’re still wearing clothes, too! Might not be for long though.”

Niall groans a little and buries his face in Zayn’s neck again. “Go away, Harry”, he mumbles.

“This is still my place”, Harry protests cheerily. “You could always go to Zayn’s though, transfer whatever was just gonna happen to his place.”

Niall blushes and tries not to think about what Harry is implying because he might or might not have thought about Zayn every single time he’s touched himself since _that_ night, wasn’t able to get off to anything else, but he doesn’t plan on telling Zayn that, and he doesn’t want to get hard right now either. Zayn thinking he’s only in this for the sex is about the last thing he wants.

Zayn doesn’t seem bothered though, just tells Harry to fuck off good naturedly and then whispers in Niall’s ear: “We could really go to mine though, if you want to.”

Niall lifts his head to look at him. “Do _you_ want to?”

“I feel like we still have a lot to talk about”, Zayn nods, “so we could always just go back for that…and see what else we wanna do.” His tone is a tiny bit suggestive and Niall looks at him until his face breaks into a smirk and he leans in for a quick kiss. When Zayn pulls away, he murmurs: “Haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.”

Niall makes a strange choked off noise and takes an abrupt step backwards, bringing some space between them. “Okay”, he says shortly. “Okay, let’s go.”

Zayn laughs at him a little bit but his eyes seem to be darker than usual when he very unsubtly lets his gaze swoop down Niall’s body and reaches for his hand, tangling their fingers together. They try not to pay any mind to the other three shouting friendly abuse at them, but Niall stops them in the door and turns around. “Thank you”, he says. “For making us talk.”

All three of them smile graciously and then Liam's ushering them out of the door with a gentle hand and closes it in their faces. Niall and Zayn look at each sheepishly but then Zayn shrugs with one shoulder and grins at Niall. “At least we don't have to worry about ditching anyone.”

Niall laughs. “No, they really set this one up pretty well.”

“I'm glad they did”, Zayn agrees as they start walking. “Dunno if we would've ever gotten it right ourselves, I proper fancied you for quite some time now and I was so sure I was making it more than obvious.”

“Well, to be fair”, Niall says. “ _I_ was trying really hard to hide my crush on you.”

Zayn reaches for his hand and Niall happily tangles their fingers while Zayn says: “We definitely are a bit daft though. If we'd just talked!”

Niall shrugs and squeezes his fingers. “Wish we had, but there's no changing it now, yeah? We'll just have to make up for the time lost.”

“And we will. I can finally truthfully introduce you to everyone as my boyfriend, and I like that.”

Niall smiles a little bashfully, feels his face heat up. He’s been waiting for this so long. “I like that, too.”

“There’re more things I like”, Zayn says, lifting and eyebrow teasingly and Niall grins.

“Yeah? What are those?”

“Well, for one”, Zayn starts and stops them in the middle of the sidewalk. “I can do this now.” Niall’s been sort of expecting it, but he’s still a little stunned when Zayn grabs his face and kisses him, right there on a busy London street. He kisses him back happily though, puts his hands on Zayn’s hips to steady them.

When Zayn pulls away they’re both a little flushed but smiling. “I like that, too”, Niall says. They walk a few steps in silence, and then Niall asks: “So how did they know? About us? I didn’t think I told anyone enough to figure it out.”

“I told Harry a few days ago”, Zayn admits. “Had to talk to someone about it. I guess he told the others and they came up with this plan.”

Niall squeezes his hand. “I’m really glad we have them to watch out for us.”

Zayn chuckles. “Yeah, definitely.”

It doesn't take long for them to walk to Zayn's flat, but it feels too long, when there's a constant thrumming under Niall's skin, electricity wherever Zayn touches him. He wants to put his hands all over Zayn, not even necessarily sexually, just to _feel_ him. And maybe because he's allowed to now, to touch and look as much as he likes.

“You're staring again”, Zayn teases him just as they arrive at his building.

Niall elbows him lightly but keeps him close by holding on to his hand. “Just happy, I guess.”

He knows for a fact that both him and Zayn usually take the stairs to Zayn's flat on the third floor, but today they seem to have come to the quiet conclusion that they're taking the elevator. It makes Niall think about the last time he was with Zayn and his ears start to burn.

“I'm happy, too”, Zayn smiles as they step into the small cabin and then he kisses him again. This time it's not as chaste as it was out on the street, and Niall finds himself pressed up against the mirror just like _that_ night. He moans quietly and sucks on Zayn's tongue, shoves one of his hands in the back pocket of Zayn's skinny jeans and feels his hips dip forward in response. And suddenly the things Niall feels are in fact sexual, he still wants to put his hands all over Zayn, but he wants to feel him everywhere too. Inside him, if possible.

He groans at the thought and Zayn chuckles against his mouth, undoubtedly able to feel Niall hardening between them. He pulls away when the elevator stops, gives Niall one more close-mouthed kiss. “Eager, are we?”

“Sorta”, Niall mumbles, follows him to his door and plasters himself against Zayn’s back, presses his lips against the back of Zayn’s neck and to his shoulder where his collar dips low. “Want to feel you.”

Zayn shivers and pulls them inside, has Niall pressed up against the wall in no time while he kicks the door shut behind them. They kiss for what feels like forever, and Niall shoves his hands under Zayn’s shirt, presses his fingers into the dips between his ribs. When he pulls Zayn’s shirt over his head, it’s purely to have better access to his skin. “Bedroom?” Zayn eventually suggest in a low murmur against Niall’s neck, and Niall nods eagerly.

Niall has a sense of déjà-vu when they make their way across the flat, neither of them willing to let go of the other, so they bump into at least three different things – a chair, a wall and the doorframe to Zayn's room. “Do you remember that night?” he asks quietly, pulling away a little bit once they’ve arrived safely.

Zayn looks at him thoughtfully, leans over to kiss him chastely. “Yeah, I do. I might've been piss drunk but I remember everything and don't regret a thing. Except maybe falling asleep before I could ask you to stay.”

“I can stay this time.”

Zayn laughs. “You better.”

Suddenly, Niall feels like he's about to float away with how light everything feels so he just kisses Zayn a bit harder, moves them towards the bed.

They tumble down on it sort of gracefully, and again Niall is reminded of the last time he saw Zayn like this, looking up at him with his Disney prince-like sparkling eyes. He wonders briefly why he didn't at least suspect something because Zayn's face looks a lot like Niall thinks his does when he looks at Zayn, but then Zayn distracts him by placing his hand at the nape of Niall's neck. “So do you remember, too?” he whispers.

Niall nods, leans down to press a kiss to Zayn’s cheek, and then his mouth. “Everything.”

Zayn smiles and wraps his arms more around Niall, and then he suddenly tugs hard enough so Niall loses his balance and collapses right on top of him. Zayn giggles and Niall is beyond endeared, muffles his laugh in Zayn’s neck and stays where he is, feeling Zayn’s hands move up and down his back softly.

“We don’t have to do anything tonight”, Zayn says eventually. “Like, I wasn’t lying when I said I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you, but it’s cool if you wanna wait, like.”

Niall shakes his head a little and presses his lips to Zayn’s neck. “Haven’t gotten you out of my head either.”

“Yeah?” Zayn asks, and his tone is suddenly a lot cheekier. “Been thinking about me as well?”

Niall lifts his head so he can look at Zayn, shifts a little so their hips are aligned and grins at Zayn. “What kind of thinking are we talking about here?”

Zayn smirks and his one hand wanders down Niall’s back to settle on his butt. “Have you gotten off thinking about me, Niall?”

Under his cockiness, Niall can tell Zayn’s still a little insecure about all of this, maybe not certain how Niall feels yet, so he follows the pressure from the hand on his butt and can’t help groaning at the friction. “Yeah, more often than I should’ve.”

How right Niall was with his assumptions is visible when Zayn’s face goes surprised at that – and also very turned on. “Wait, for real?”

“Yeah, Zayn”, Niall says and brings his hips down once more, watches Zayn’s eyelids flutter shut. “I sort of had it under control when it was still mostly my imagination, but it got harder once I got more imagery.”

“Like what?” Zayn asks and Niall grins. Is this supposed to be their dirty talk or are they actually having a conversation while grinding on each other?

“Like when I woke up in your tiny bed with you all pressed against my back and your hand shoved under my shirt. When I could still feel your mouth on my throat from the night before. Too much, that.”

“You wanked in my parent’s house?” Zayn asks and he sounds equally scandalised and turned on.

“Was proper ashamed, too”, Niall mumbles and ducks down to suck on the skin of Zayn’s neck.

Zayn grips him a little tighter and tilts his hips upwards. “I think it’s hot. And I've been imagining you too, what I'd do to you if I ever got you naked again.”

Niall lets out an almost involuntary moan. “Show me, then.”

Zayn flips them around then, so he's on top, smirking down at Niall. “We should get rid of this, then, shouldn't we?” he asks, tugging on Niall's shirt. With a grin, Niall sits up so Zayn moves to straddle him, and he lifts his arms expectantly. Zayn helps him pull it off and then kisses him deeply, hand on the back of Niall's neck.

They lie back on Zayn's bed and snog for what feels like forever to Niall, but in a more than good way. Zayn gets impatient after a while though, wrestles a hand in between their bodies to get to Niall's waistband, fumbling with the button of his jeans. He brings a bit of space between them to open it properly and Niall lifts his hips helpfully so Zayn can pull his skinnies off. He promptly presses his lips to the naked skin right above the waistband of Niall's boxers, making him shiver and arch off the bed slightly.

“You're so beautiful”, Zayn mumbles, “don't think I got to tell you that last time.”

“Says you”, Niall says, but he’s distracted by the way Zayn’s hand slide up the back of his thighs while he kisses around Niall’s belly button. He lifts a hand and places it on Zayn’s head, rubs across the stubbly hair. It feels funny, and surprisingly soft still. “You cut your hair.”

“Yeah”, Zayn says, and then he’s up there right by Niall’s face again. They’re still close, both lying on their sides and Zayn’s hand is on Niall’s side, stroking lightly. “Felt like I needed a change, y’know?”

Niall nods and touches Zayn’s nose carefully, feels the stud there. “That why you did this too?”

“I’d been thinking about it for a while”, Zayn explains. “Figured now was as good as any time.”

Niall smiles. “It looks sick.”

“Yeah?” Zayn asks.

Niall scoots closer, tucks two fingers under Zayn’s waistband. “Bloody hot”, he whispers and leans in to kiss Zayn, biting his lower lip and pulling sharply.

Zayn groans and rolls them over again until he’s hovering over Niall. He lets Niall undo the button of his jeans and then gets up, shoves them and his boxers down in one go. Niall doesn’t get much time to stare because Zayn dives right back in, and Niall arches up into his touch. There’s so much _skin_ and his fingers roam across Zayn’s body trying to touch it all, impatiently. He gets his hands on Zayn’s butt and pulls him down at the same time he bucks his own hips up, and their moans resound around Zayn’s bedroom.

“Fuck”, Zayn mumbles and detaches his mouth from Niall’s to get his hands on the boxers he’s still wearing. Niall lifts his hips helpfully, Zayn tosses the fabric blindly off his bed and then they’re finally both naked. When they start grinding again it’s so good Niall almost sees stars, and he’s rock hard by now.

“Zayn”, he pants, digs his fingers into his shoulder, “Fuck me. Please, want you to fuck me.”

Zayn curses under his breath and slides his hands down Niall's side to his butt, giving it a squeeze that has Niall keening high in his throat. He hisses when Zayn stretches to grab for lube and a condom in his bedside drawer and his hip presses down on Niall’s hard cock.

Zayn makes an apologetic sound and reaches down, wraps his fingers around Niall’s cock and pulls a couple of times, until Niall’s whining again.

“C’mon, Zayn”, he groans and Zayn just hums, kisses his collarbone and starts sucking lightly. Niall sighs and flips them around, laughing at Zayn's surprised face when he's suddenly the one staring up at Niall. With a cheeky grin and a peck to his mouth, Niall wraps his hand around Zayn and gives a few experimental tugs, swipes his thumb across the head and watches Zayn's eyes flutter shut at the sensation. He's still as responsive as Niall remembers and he takes full advantage of that, tries to pull as many noises as possible from Zayn while he works him over with his hand.

He's not the only one who remembers stuff though, as Zayn's hands finally find his nipples, rubbing both of them teasingly and just the right side of rough. Niall's arms actually go a bit weak when Zayn sucks one of them into his mouth and easily lets him turn them around again.

“You like that, huh?” Zayn asks and immediately goes back to licking across the pink, hard bud. Niall moans out a “yes” when Zayn starts biting lightly, the pain making his whole body tingle. He's always been extra sensitive there, his nipples are very important during sex. He's glad Zayn seems to have realised and remembered that, so he doesn't even have to say anything.

He arches his back, desperate for more friction, and Zayn chuckles, places a hand on his hip to keep him steady and stop him from grinding against Zayn’s upper body that is conveniently situated between his legs. “Zayn”, he whines again, and Zayn looks up at him, lips red and shiny from what he’s been doing with them.

“What is it?” he asks, infuriatingly calm. “What do you want, Niall? Tell me what you want me to do to you.”

Niall can feel his whole body quiver and he pushes his hips upwards, his fingers digging into Zayn’s shoulder when he moans out loud. “I want you to open me up. Want you to fuck me.”

Zayn smirks and then he’s suddenly further down between Niall’s legs, a hand on his dick – and then he’s licking a stripe up the underside and Niall almost chokes on the sound he makes. Zayn is kitten licking the tip and Niall pushes upwards, can’t really help it, but Zayn takes him easily, just opens his mouth and starts sucking lightly. Niall sees stars when Zayn starts jacking the part of is cock he doesn’t fit in his mouth and he tries to grab Zayn’s hair, only to realise there’s nothing to hold on to.

“Zayn”, he chokes out instead. “Stop, Zayn. ‘m gonna come if you don’t stop.”

Zayn pulls off with a slurping sound that should probably not be sexy, but Niall can barely think straight so he supposes it’s okay for his dick to jerk in Zayn’s hand. Zayn smirks again and kisses the inside of his thigh. “D’you want me to prep you, then?” he asks, and his voice is raspy.

“Yeah”, Niall breathes. “Please.”

The sound the lube makes when Zayn opens it and coats his fingers with it isn’t enough to prepare Niall for the cold first touch against his rim that has Niall tensing up. “Y’alright, babes?” Zayn asks, not moving any further.

“Fine”, Niall nods. “’s cold, is all. Move.”

He can hear Zayn rub his fingers together to warm them up and he smiles faintly, but then one finger is back between his legs, prodding carefully against his rim and it’s all he can focus on. Zayn pushes one finger in slowly and Niall keens, rolls his hips to get him deeper. This is a stretch he’s used to, can take it easily, and he gets impatient quickly.

“More”, he pants, and Zayn does as he’s told, adds another finger and scissors them carefully. He seems intently focused on what he’s doing and Niall thinks it’s never been hotter being fingered. He fucks himself down against Zayn’s fingers and the other man groans.

“You’re so greedy for it, aren’t you? Want to be fucked real good?”

“Yes”, Niall hisses, and the stretch when Zayn adds a third finger feels so good he forgets to be embarrassed about his neediness. “Yes, c’mon, more.”

“Alright”, Zayn mumbles. “Almost there.”

His finger grazes Niall's prostrate and Niall grips the sheets more tightly. “Can I ride you?” he asks breathlessly because suddenly, he can't think of anything but sinking down on Zayn's dick real nice and slow.

Zayn's fingers still and when Niall looks, he's just staring up at him. “Holy shit”, he breathes. “Yes, Niall, fuck.”

“Go on, then”, Niall says. “I'm ready, I can take you.”

Zayn doesn't wait any longer, and Niall hisses at the loss when he pulls out his fingers to roll on a condom and lube up instead. They kiss again for a whole minute before Niall gets impatient and pushes Zayn onto his back. He goes with a small “oof” and grins up at Niall who kisses him quick and then straddles him, sits down straight in his lap. Zayn groans and scoots up the bed a little bit, grip tight on Niall's hip.

Niall leans forward to kiss him once more and then he's lowering himself down on Zayn's cock. The head catches at his rim and they both gasp, but Niall breathes through it and sinks down lower, the stretch burning a little, until he's seated with his butt snug against Zayn's hips.

“Fuck”, Zayn mumbles. “Holy shit, you feel so good. So tight, babe.”

Niall hums and flexes his thighs to lift himself up just the tiniest bit before dropping down again. He repeats the movement just for the look on Zayn's face and then starts bouncing properly. Zayn's holding on to his hips and at this angle, he hits his prostrate with almost every thrust, and Niall's pretty sure all the neighbours can hear them at this point but he really doesn't care.

He starts swivelling his hips, feels Zayn's hands tighten and the burn in his thighs intensify. Zayn reaches for his bouncing cock now, trying to find a rhythm in sync with Niall's movement, and the heat pools low in his stomach, but his thighs are starting to quiver.

“Zayn”, he pants, “stop.”

It’s cute, really, how concerned Zayn looks immediately even though he’s balls deep in Niall. “What’s wrong, babes?”

“I’m fine”, Niall says, kisses Zayn quickly to reassure him. “Just haven’t done enough squats, I reckon. My thighs-“

Zayn chuckles. “You wanna switch positions?”

Niall nods and lets Zayn help him get off his lap and onto his back. “Like this?” Zayn asks when he’s hovering above Niall and the latter nods again and wraps his legs around Zayn’s waist to pull him close. Zayn pushes all the way in right away and Niall throws his head back, moans in pleasure. Zayn’s mouth is at his throat then, kissing and sucking, and Niall clings to his shoulders desperately, pushes his hips against Zayn’s for even more pressure.

Zayn picks up the pace and Niall is moaning unabashedly now, can’t keep the stream of curse words, Zayn’s name and unintelligible sounds in with how _perfect_ it all feels. When Zayn pulls out again he lets out a high pitched whine, but Zayn shushes and kisses him before repositioning Niall’s legs so they’re resting on his shoulders now, and pushes back in.

Unbelievably, it’s even better this way, and Niall has to squeeze his eyes shut and concentrate on not coming right there and then. “You good, Ni?” Zayn asks and sounds as breathless as Niall feels.

“Close”, Niall chokes out and tries to kiss him, but it ends more with them panting in each other’s mouths. Zayn reaches between them and strokes Niall’s cock that’s throbbing already.

“You gonna come for me?” Zayn murmurs against Niall’s lips and Niall nods frantically, meets his thrusts almost desperately.

All it takes after that is for Zayn to swipe his thumb across the head, pressing into the slit, and then Niall is coming, spurting come across Zayn’s hand and his own stomach and chest. Zayn pushes in once, twice more, and then he comes too, with a groan that sounds a lot like Niall’s name.

Niall is pretty sure they kiss breathlessly for a few moments but then again he also thinks he blacks out for a minute because he can’t remember Zayn pulling out and throwing the used condom away, but he comes back to when Zayn returns to the bed and cuddles up to him, sweaty and sticky and warm as they are. Niall doesn’t mind one bit.

“Would it be terribly predictable of me to tell you I love you right after you've made me come?” Zayn asks tiredly from where he’s spread out on top of Niall and Niall laughs, lifting a hand to rub it up and down Zayn's sweaty back.

“Maybe, but also sort of flattering?” He kisses Zayn's temple. “’Sides, you’ve already told me once today, so it doesn't seem like sex was your only incentive.”

“I even told you more than once”, Zayn says proudly. “But good. I love you.”

Niall sighs happily. How has this become his life? “I love you, too.” They lay there contently for a few seconds before Niall frowns a little. “However, you _are_ getting a tiny bit sticky and heavy on top of me there.”

“Trying to get rid of me already?” Zayn asks, voice still muffled against Niall's shoulder, and bites him teasingly.

“You're welcome to join me in the shower”, Niall grins. “Wouldn't even have to let go of me.”

“Yeah, but…I'd have to get up.”

“Hmm”, Niall hums. “Guess you're gonna have to make do with a wet flannel then, while I'm in the shower, naked, all alone…”

Zayn makes a sound and starts stirring against Niall, rutting his hips forward just the slightest bit. Niall laughs loudly. “Knew that'd get you going, you horndog.”

Zayn pokes his side but Niall can feel him grinning against his neck. “We've only just started dating and you're already abusing me.” He rolls off Niall, flops onto his back. “How is this fair?”

“You love me anyway”, Niall grins smugly and gets up, offering Zayn a hand to help him up.

He grabs it and hauls himself up, colliding with Niall and wrapping an arm around his waist to steady them. “That I do”, he says, kisses the corner of Niall's mouth who can't stop smiling. “Now, shower? I was promised a show.”

Niall laughs and slaps his butt when Zayn lets go and heads for the bathroom. “No show for you, you perv. At least none that doesn't involve both of us.”

Zayn’s laugh rings back to him from the bathroom and Niall feels floaty and happy. “That's settled, then.”

-

“So you’re saying”, Waliyha asks incredulously, “you weren’t actually dating any of the times we got to see you before?”

“Yeah”, Zayn shrugs sheepishly while his whole family stares at them disbelievingly. Niall feels awkward.

“But you are now?” Safaa clarifies and Niall smiles, because, yeah. Three weeks of officially calling Zayn his boyfriend haven’t been enough for him to get used to hearing it.

“Yep”, he says and can’t quite hold in the dopey smile. Zayn nudges his shoulder lightly with his own and when Niall looks over, he’s smiling too.

“I can’t believe you pulled this off”, Doniya says, awed. “Like, you were crazy about each other at dad’s birthday. I didn’t know you were that good of an actor, Zaynie.”

“Dunno how much of it was acting at that point”, Zayn mumbles and Niall smiles bashfully down into his lap.

“What I can’t believe is that you knew each other for what, two days, when we first met Niall?” Waliyha says. “I mean, I could tell it was a pretty new relationship, but I believed the four months or whatever it was you told us. And then at dad’s birthday…I could’ve sworn more than two weeks had passed. “

“Yeah, me too”, Niall laughs. “By that time I was totally done for.”

“Mum, Dad?” Zayn asks and Niall suddenly realises they’ve both been quiet since they told them the whole story.

“So you really weren’t over Perrie when this whole thing started?” Trisha asks, and looks at her son worriedly.

“Yeah, no, I don’t know”, Zayn shrugs again. “I didn’t think I was, at least. Looking back, I think I was more hung up on the memory of her. And Niall made me realise that very quickly.” Zayn’s hand finds Niall’s and the latter gives it a squeeze. He feels strangely nervous that Trisha and Yaser won’t accept him.

“Why did you agree to help him, Niall?” Trisha turns to Niall then. Her voice doesn’t sound accusing or angry, mostly curious, but he still swallows anxiously before he answers.

“Um, well. First it was because he looked downright desperate when he introduced me to Perrie on the tube, and I didn’t want to be the guy to embarrass him by not playing along. And, I don’t know, things kind of spiralled from there, through coincidences at first and then…then because I fell in love with him and wasn’t willing to let him go, I guess.”

All three of Zayn’s sisters coo at that and Niall feels himself blush. Zayn grips his hand tighter and looks at his parents. “Don’t be mad at us for lying to you. It was entirely my fault, and I’m sorry. But I can’t regret a thing of it, because it got me Niall, and I couldn’t be happier about that.”

“We’re not mad”, Trisha says softly. “Right, Yaser? We’re not mad, we just wish you would’ve trusted us. But it doesn’t really change anything, does it? Niall is a lovely young man and he’s obviously very good for you, but we already thought so when we last saw you so there’s really nothing to do but be happy for the two of you. And we are.”

Yaser nods gravely and gets up, hand stretched out in front of him. Niall gets up too when he realises it’s meant for him, and reaches out nervously. Yaser grips his hand and shakes it firmly, and then he surprises everyone by pulling Niall in for a quick hug. “Thank you for being so good for my boy.”

“Dad”, Zayn groans, but he sounds kind of endeared. When Niall looks at him, he’s smiling big, eyes crinkling and tongue pressing against the back of his teeth.

Trisha hugs Niall next, kisses him on both cheeks. “Welcome to the family, Niall.”

Niall almost tears up and Zayn’s sister crowd close for a sort of group hug that actually makes Niall cry a bit. A month ago he thought he’d never see these people again, and he’s incredibly happy that has changed, and that they’re still as warm as they were last time. Zayn kisses him softly over Safaa’s head, one hand at the back of Niall’s neck, and Niall actually feels about to burst, happier than he’s ever been.

“Well, this has been just about the cheesiest thing I’ve ever witnessed”, a voice says from the doorway, and Niall turns around with narrowed eyes.

“No one told you to eavesdrop, Louis”, he says. “You could’ve just stayed in the kitchen with Liam and Harry.”

“Um”, Harry makes and emerges from behind the door with a sheepish wave while Liam looks around the corner looking appropriately embarrassed.

Niall sighs but can’t really keep in a fond chuckle at their friend’s antics. “Alright, then, way to ruin a good first impression in front of my boyfriend’s family. These are my friends Louis and Liam”, he introduces.

“Oh, the famous flatmate”, Waliyha nods knowingly. “Have you already walked in on them or do they really always come here like they lied about to us?”

“Wali!” Zayn yells and the tips of his ears go red. Niall would find it adorable if his own face wasn’t burning as well.

“Nothing serious, like”, Liam says with a grin. “But they do snog anywhere and everywhere, all the time.”

“Literally can’t keep their hands off each other”, Louis pipes up. “It’s nauseating.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen Zayn alone since they’ve gotten together”, Harry adds helpfully. Niall is hiding his face in Zayn’s shoulder, who’s got an arm around him and the other hand covering his face.

“I really don't have trouble picturing that”, Doniya teases them and Zayn groans again.

“I wish we would've just told you via FaceTime instead of inviting you over.”

“And we should look for new friends”, Niall agrees, but he's secretly more than happy that everyone is getting along this well.

They leave for the kitchen not much later, mostly to get drinks but also for some privacy. They gravitate towards each other immediately, hugging tightly in the middle of Zayn's kitchen.

“This really couldn't have gone much better”, Zayn says quietly and Niall nods, face pressed in the crook of his neck.

“Love you”, he mumbles and cranes his face upwards to kiss Zayn's jaw.

“Love you too”, Zayn smiles and pulls back a little to give Niall a proper kiss. It’s soft and loving without any intent to take it any further – there are guests in the lounge, after all – but they do get lost in each other for a moment.

There's a cough from the doorway and they startle apart without letting go of each other completely. Liam's there, smiling gently at them. “Just thought I'd check if you needed any help”, he explains. “Before Louis gets any ideas, you know?”

“Thanks, Li”, Niall laughs. “We're fine, though.”

“Just don't take too long”, Liam winks and Zayn flips him off good-naturedly.

“Alright, Leeyum, we're coming.”

They do part after all and Liam grins before turning around. Niall opens the fridge to get some water and sodas out while Zayn puts on the kettle. He's back immediately, wrapping his arms around Niall's waist from behind, chin hooked over his shoulder.

“Alright, babe?” Niall asks, turning his head just enough to kiss Zayn's cheek softly, and places his hands on top of Zayn's. It all feels very domestic and calm.

Zayn hums, kisses his neck and bites the spot gently. “’m just very happy.”

Niall smiles, listens to the voices of their friends mixing with those of Zayn’s family in the room next door. “Yeah, me too.”

“We should invite your family next time, too”, Zayn suggests and Niall turns around in his arms. He’s told Zayn about them, obviously, but he doesn’t talk about his family too often because it makes him realise how rarely he makes it over. To see that Zayn wants to meet them, not just over FaceTime like they’d done the weekend before, makes his stomach feel all fluttery again.

“I’d love that”, he says, kisses Zayn’s nose and then his lips quickly. “They’re gonna want you to come over for Christmas with me next though, they’re like that.”

Zayn shrugs lightly, grinning a little. “I bet Mullingar is lovely at Christmas.”

“It is”, Niall laughs and kisses him once more before he lets him go. “Come on, let’s get those drinks over now, or they’ll send Louis to come looking for us.”

Zayn shudders exaggeratedly and goes to grab the tray with the tea, while Niall takes the cold drinks. They get to the door at the same time and Zayn smiles, nudges his shoulder against Niall’s carefully. “Hey”, he says. “I’m glad I sat down next to you on that train.”

“Yeah”, Niall smiles, so wide he can’t even kiss Zayn’s cheek like he wants to, has to bite at his shoulder through his t-shirt instead. “Yeah, me too.”


End file.
